LIBRARY 


THE  SECRET  PLACES 
OF  THE  HEART 


If  Mr.  WELLS  has  also  written  the 
following  novels: 

LOVE    AND   ME.   LEWISHAM 

KIPPS 

MR.    POLLY 

THE  WHEELS  OF  CHANCE 

THE  NEW  MACHIAVELLI 

ANN  VERONICA 

TONO  BUNGAY 

MARRIAGE 

BEALBY 

THE  PASSIONATE  FRIENDS 

THE    WIFE    OF    SIR    ISAAC    HAR- 

MAN 
THE    RESEARCH    MAGNIFICENT 
MR.  BRITLING  SEES  IT   THROUGH 
THE    SOUL   OF   A   BISHOP 
JOAN    AND    PETER 
THE   UNDYING  FIRE 

If  The  following  fantastic  and.  imag- 
inative romances: 

THE  WAR   OF  THE   WORLDS 

THE    TIME    MACHINE 

THE   WONDERFUL   VISIT 

THE  ISLAND   OF  DR.  MOREAU 

THE   SEA  LADY 

THE  SLEEPER  AWAKES 

THE  FOOD  CF  THE  GODS 

THE  WAR  IN  THE  AIR 

THE  FIRST  MEN  IN  THE  MOON' 

IN  THE  DAYS  OF  THE  COMET 

THE  WORLD  SET  FREE 

And  numerous  Short  Stories  now  collected 
in  One  Volume  under  the  titlo  of 

THE  COUNTRY  OF  THE  BLIND 

If  A  Series  of  books  upon  Social,  Re* 
ligious,  and  Political  questions: 

ANTICIPATIONS    (1900) 

MANKIND   IN   THE  MAKING 

FIRST  AND  LAST  THINGS 

NEW    WORLDS    FOR    OLD 

A  MODERN  UTOPIA 

THE   FUTURE   IN   AMERICA 

AN  ENGLISHMAN  LOOKS  AT  THE 

WORLD 
WHAT    IS    COMING? 
WAR  AND   THE  FUTURE 
IN    THE    FOURTH    YEAR 
GOD    THE    INVISIBLE    KING 
THE  OUTLINE  OF  HISTORY 
RUSSIA  IN  THE  SHADOWS 
THE     SALVAGING     OF     CIVILIZA- 
TION 
WASHINGTON    AND    THE    RIDDLE 
OF  PEACE 

X  And  two  little  books  about  chil- 
dren's play,  called: 

FLOOR  GAMES  and  LITTLE  WARS 


THE  SECRET  PLACES 
OF  THE  HEART 


BY 

H.  G.  WELLS 


TLTEMACMILLAX  COMPANY 
1922 

All  rights  reserved 


ffBINIBD  IN  THE  UNITED  STATES  OF  AMEEIOA 


COPYRIGHT,    1921    AND   1022, 

Br  The  international  magazine  COMPANY, 

Copyright,  1921  and  1922, 

By  H.   G.   WELLS. 


Set  up  and  electrotyped.     Published  May,   1922i 
All  rights  reserved  by  the  Author. 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

1.  The  Consultation 

2.  Lady  Hardy  .... 

3.  The  Departure     .... 

4.  At  Maidenhead     .... 

5.  In  the  Land  of  the  Forgotten  Peoples 
G.  The  Encounter  at  Stonehenge     . 

7.  Companionship       .... 

8.  Full  Moon  ..... 

9.  The  Last  Days  of  Sir  Richmond  Hardy 


PAQD 
1 

22 

26 

42 

99 

.   125 

.,  172 

.   221 

.   261 

THE   SECRET  PLACES 
OF  THE  HEART 

CHAPTER  THE  FIRST 

THE   CONSULTATION 

^       1 

The  maid  was  a  young  woman  of  great  natural 
calmness;  she  was  accustomed  to  let  in  visitors 
who  had  this  air  of  being  annoyed  and  finding  one 
umbrella  too  numerous  for  them.  It  mattered 
nothing  to  her  that  the  gentleman  was  asking  for 
Dr.  Martineau  as  if  he  was  asking  for  something 
with  an  unpleasanl  taste.  Almost  imperceptibly 
she  relieved  him  of  bis  umbrella  and  juggled  his 
hat  and  ooat  on  <<>  a  massive  mahogany  stand. 
"What  uame,  Sir!"  she  asked,  holding  open  the 
door  of  the  consulting  room. 

"Hardy,"  Baid  the  gentleman,  and  then  yield- 
it,  reluctantly  with  its  distasteful  three-year- 
old  honour,  "Sir  Richmond  Bardy." 

The  doer  closed  softly  behind  him  and  he  found 
himself  in  undivided  po         ion  of  the  large  indif- 

1 


2  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

f  erent  apartment  in  which  the  nervous  and  mental 
troubles  of  the  outer  world  eddied  for  a  time  on 
their  way  to  the  distinguished  specialist.  A  bowl 
of  daffodils,  a  handsome  bookcase  containing 
bound  Victorian  magazines  and  antiquated  medi- 
cal works,  some  paintings  of  Scotch  scenery,  three 
big  armchairs,  a  buhl  clock,  and  a  bronze  Dancing 
Faun,  by  their  want  of  any  collective  idea  en- 
hanced rather  than  mitigated  the  promiscuous  dis- 
regard of  the  room.  He  drifted  to  the  midmost 
of  the  three  windows  and  stared  out  despondently 
at  Harley  Street. 

For  a  minute  or  so  he  remained  as  still  and  limp 
as  an  empty  jacket  on  its  peg,  and  then  a  gust  of 
irritation  stirred  him. 

"Damned  fool  I  was  to  come  here,"  he  said. 
.  .  .  "Damned  fool! 

1 '  Rush  out  of  the  place  f  .  .  . 

"I've  given  my  name."  .   .  , 

He  heard  the  door  behind  him  open  and  for  a 
moment  pretended  not  to  hear.  Then  he  turned 
round.  "I  don't  see  what  you  can  do  for  me," 
he  said. 

"I'm  sure  I  don't,"  said  the  doctor.  "People 
come  here  and  talk." 

There  was  something  reassuringly  inaggressive 
about  the  figure  that  confronted  Sir  Richmond. 
Dr.  Martineau's  height  wanted  at  least  three 
inches  of  Sir  Richmond's  five  feet  eleven;  he  was 
humanly  plump,  his  face  was  round  and  pink  and 


THE  CONSULTATION  3 

cheerfully  wistful,  a  little  suggestive  of  the  full 
moon,  of  what  the  full  moon  might  be  if  it  could 
get  fresh  air  and  exercise.  Either  his  tailor  had 
made  his  trousers  too  short  or  he  had  braced  them 
too  high  so  that  he  seemed  to  have  grown  out  of 
them  quite  recently.  Sir  Richmond  had  been 
dreading  an  encounter  with  some  dominating  and 
mesmeric  personality;  this  amiable  presence  dis- 
pelled his  preconceived  resistances. 

Dr.  Martineau,  a  little  out  of  breath  as  though 
he  had  been  running  upstairs,  with  his  hands  in  his 
trouser  pockets,  seemed  intent  only  on  disavowals. 
"People  come  here  and  talk.  It  does  them  good, 
and  sometimes  I  am  able  to  offer  a  suggestion. 

"Talking  to  someone  who  understands  a  little," 
he  expanded  the  idea. 

"I'm  jangling  damnably  .  .  .  overwork.  .  .  ." 

"Not  overwork,"  Dr.  Martineau  corrected. 
"Not  overwork.  Overwork  never  hurt  anyone. 
Fatigue  stops  that.  A  man  can  work — good 
straightforward  work,  without  internal  resistance, 
until  he  drops, — and  never  hurt  himself.  You 
must  be  working  against  friction." 

"Friction!  I'm  like  a  machine  without  oil.  I'm 
grinding  to  death.  .  .  .  And  it's  so  damned  im- 
portant I  shouldn't  break  down.  It's  vitally 
important." 

He  stressed  his  words  and  reinforced  them  with 
a  quivering  gesture  of  hifl  upraised  clenched  hand. 
"My  temper's  in  rags.     I  explode  at  any  little 


4  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

thing.  I'm  raw.  I  can't  work  steadily  for  ten 
minutes  and  I  can't  leave  off  working." 

"Your  name,"  said  the  doctor,  ''is  familiar. 
Sir  Richmond  Hardy?  In  the  papers.  What  is 
it?" 

"Fuel." 

"Of  course!  The  Fuel  Commission.  Stupid 
of  me !    We  certainly  can't  afford  to  have  you  ill. ' ' 

"I  am  ill.  But  you  can't  afford  to  have  me  ab- 
sent from  that  Commission." 

' '  Your  technical  knowledge " 

' '  Technical  knowledge  be  damned !  Those  men 
mean  to  corner  the  national  fuel  supply.  And 
waste  it!  For  their  profits.  That's  what  I'm 
up  against.  You  don't  know  the  job  I  have  to  do. 
You  don't  know  what  a  Commission  of  that  sort 
is.  The  moral  tangle  of  it.  You  don't  know  how 
its  possibilities  and  limitations  are  canvassed  and 
schemed  about,  long  before  a  single  member  is 
appointed.  Old  Cassidy  worked  the  whole  thing 
with  the  prime  minister.  I  can  see  that  now  as 
plain  as  daylight.  I  might  have  seen  it  at  first. 
.  .  .  Three  experts  who'd  been  got  at;  they 
thought  Z'd  been  got  at;  two  Labour  men  who'd 
do  anything  you  wanted  them  to  do  provided  you 
called  them  'level-headed.'  Wagstaffe  the  social- 
ist art  critic  who  could  be  trusted  to  play  the  fool 
and  make  nationalization  look  silly,  and  the  rest 
mine  owners,  railway  managers,  oil  profiteers,  fi- 
nancial adventurers.  ..." 


THE  CONSULTATION  5 

He  was  fairly  launched.  "It's  the  blind  folly 
of  it !  In  the  days  before  the  war  it  was  different. 
Then  there  was  abundance.  A  little  grabbing  or 
cornering  was  all  to  the  good.  All  to  the  good. 
It  prevented  things  being  used  up  too  fast.  And 
the  world  was  running  by  habit;  the  inertia  was 
tremendous.  You  could  take  all  sorts  of  liberties. 
But  all  this  is  altered.  We  're  living  in  a  different 
world.  The  public  won't  stand  things  it  used  to 
stand.  It's  anew  public.  It's — wild.  It'll  smash 
up  the  show  if  they  go  too  far.  Everything  short 
and  running  shorter — food,  fuel,  material.  But 
these  people  go  on.  They  go  on  as  though  noth- 
ing had  changed.  .  .  .  Strikes,  Russia,  nothing 
will  warn  them.  There  are  men  on  that  Commis- 
sion who  would  steal  the  brakes  off  a  mountain 
railway  just  before  they  went  down  in  it.  .  .  .  It's 

a  struggle  with  suicidal  Imbeciles.    It's !    But 

I'm  talking!    I  didn't  come  here  to  talk  Fuel." 
"You  think  there  may  be  a  smash-up?" 
"1  lie  awake  at  night,  thinking  of  it." 
"A  social  smash-up." 
"Economic.    Social.    Yes.    Don't  you?" 
"A  social  smash  up  seems  1<>  me  altogether  a 
ibility.    All  Borts  of  people  L  find  think  that," 
I  the  doctor.    "All  sorts  of  people  lie  awake 
thinking  of  H." 
"  I  wish  some  of  my  damned  Committee  would  1" 
The  doctor  turned  his  eyes  to  the  window.  "I  lie 
awake  too,"  he  said  and  seemed  to  reflect.    But  he 


6  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

was  observing  his  patient  acutely — with  his 
ears. 

"But  you  see  how  important  it  is,"  said  Sir 
Richmond,  and  left  his  sentence  unfinished. 

"I'll  do  what  I  can  for  you,"  said  the  doctor, 
and  considered  swiftly  what  line  of  talk  he  had 
best  follow. 

$2 

"This  sense  of  a  coming  smash  is  epidemic," 
said  the  doctor.  "It's  at  the  back  of  all  sorts  of 
mental  trouble.  It  is  a  new  state  of  mind.  Before 
the  war  it  was  abnormal — a  phase  of  neurasthenia. 
Now  it  is  almost  the  normal  state  with  whole 
classes  of  intelligent  people.  Intelligent,  I  say. 
The  others  always  have  been  casual  and  adven- 
turous and  always  will  be.  A  loss  of  confidence 
in  the  general  background  of  life.  So  that  we  seem 
to  float  over  abysses." 

"We  do,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"And  we  have  nothing  but  the  old  habits  and 
ideas  acquired  in  the  days  of  our  assurance.  There 
is  a  discord,  a  jarring." 

The  doctor  pursued  his  train  of  thought.  "A 
new,  raw  and  dreadful  sense  of  responsibility  for 
the  universe.  Accompanied  by  a  realization  that 
the  job  is  overwhelmingly  too  big  for  us." 

"We've  got  to  stand  up  to  the  job,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.    "Anyhow,  what  else  is  there  to  do? 


THE  CONSULTATION  7 

We  may  keep  things  together.  .  .  .  I've  got  to 
do  my  bit.  And  if  only  I  could  hold  myself  at 
it,  I  could  beat  those  fellows.  But  that's  where  the 
devil  of  it  comes  in.  Never  have  I  been  so  de- 
sirous to  work  well  in  my  life.  And  never  have 
I  been  so  slack  and  weak-willed  and  inaccurate. 
.  .  .  Sloppy.  .  .  .    Indolent.  .  .  .    Vicious!  ..." 

The  doctor  was  about  to  speak,  but  Sir  Rich- 
mond interrupted  him.  "What's  got  hold  of  me? 
What's  got  hold  of  me?  I  used  to  work  well 
enough.  It 's  as  if  my  will  had  come  untwisted  and 
was  ravelling  out  into  separate  strands.  I've  lost 
my  unity.  I'm  not  a  man  but  a  mob.  I've  got 
to  recover  my  vigour.    At  any  cost." 

Again  as  the  doctor  was  about  to  speak  the  word 
was  taken  out  of  his  mouth.  "And  what  I  think 
of  it,  Dr.  Martineau,  is  this:  it's  fatigue.  It's 
mental  and  moral  fatigue.  Too  much  effort.  On 
too  high  a  level.  And  too — austere.  One  strains 
and  fags.  Flags!  'Flags'  I  meant  to  say.  One 
strains  and  flags  and  then  the  lower  stuff  in  one, 
the  subconscious  stuff,  takes  control." 

There  was  a  flavour  of  popularized  psychoanal- 
ysis about  this,  and  the  doctor  drew  in  the  corners 
of  his  mouth  and  gave  his  head  a  critical  slant. 
"M'm."  But  this  only  made  Sir  Richmond  raise 
his  voice  and  quicken  his  speech.  "I  want,"  lie 
said,  "a  good  tonic.  A  pick-me-up,  a  stimulating 
harmless  drug  of  some  sort.  That's  indicated 
anyhow.    To  begin  with.    Something  to  pull  me 


8  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

together,  as  people  say.  Bring  me  up  to  the 
scratch  again. ' ' 

"I  don't  like  the  use  of  drugs,"  said  the 
doctor. 

The  expectation  of  Sir  Richmond's  expression 
changed  to  disappointment.  ''But  that's  not  rea- 
sonable," he  cried.  "That's  not  reasonable. 
That's  superstition.  Call  a  thing  a  drug  and  con- 
demn it !  Everything  is  a  drug.  Everything  that 
affects  you.  Food  stimulates  or  tranquillizes. 
Drink.  Noise  is  a  stimulant  and  quiet  an  opiate. 
What  is  life  but  response  to  stimulants?  Or  reac- 
tion after  them?  When  I'm  exhausted  I  want 
food.  When  I'm  overactive  and  sleepless  I  want 
tranquillizing.  When  I'm  dispersed  I  want  pull- 
ing together." 

"But  we  don't  know  how  to  use  drugs,"  the  doc- 
tor objected. 

"But  you  ought  to  know." 

Dr.  Martineau  fixed  his  eye  on  a  first  floor 
window  sill  on  the  opposite  side  of  Harley  Street. 
His  manner  suggested  a  lecturer  holding  on  to 
his  theme. 

"A  day  will  come  when  we  shall  be  able  to  ma- 
nipulate drugs — all  sorts  of  drugs — and  work  them 
in  to  our  general  way  of  living.  I  have  no  preju- 
dice against  them  at  all.  A  time  will  come  when 
we  shall  correct  our  moods,  get  down  to  our  re- 
serves of  energy  by  their  help,  suspend  fatigue, 
put  off  sleep  during  long  spells  of  exertion.    At 


THE  CONSULTATION  9 

some  sudden  crisis  for  example.  When  we  shall 
know  enough  to  know  just  how  far  to  go  with  this, 
that  or  the  other  stuff.  And  how  to  wash  out  its 
after  effects.  ...  I  quite  agree  with  you, — in 
principle.  .  .  .  But  that  time  hasn't  come  yet.  .  .  . 
Decades  of  research  yet.  ...  If  we  tried  that 
sort  of  thing  now,  we  should  be  like  children  play- 
ing with  poisons  and  explosives.  ...  It's  out 
of  the  question." 

"I've  been  taking  a  few  little  things  already. 
Easton  Syrup  for  example." 

"Strychnine.  It  carries  you  for  a  time  and 
drops  you  by  the  way.  Has  it  done  you  any  good 
— any  nett  good?  It  has — I  can  see — broken  your 
sleep." 

The  doctor  turned  round  again  to  his  patient 
and  looked  up  into  his  troubled  face. 

"Given  physiological  trouble  I  don't  mind  re- 
sorting to  a  drug.  Given  structural  injury  I  don't 
mind  surgery.  But  except  for  any  little  mischief 
your  amateur  dragging  may  have  done  you  do  not 
seem  to  me  to  be  either  sick  or  injured.  You've 
no  trouble  either  of  structure  or  material.  You're 
— worried — ill  in  your  mind,  and  otherwise  per- 
fectly sound.  It's  the  ourrenl  of  your  thoughts, 
fermenting,    [f  the  trouble  is  in  the  menial  sphere, 

why  go  out,  of  the  mental  sphere  for  a  treatment? 

Talk  and  thought ;  these  are  your  remedies.  Cool 
deliberate  thought.    You're  unravelled.    You  say 

it  yourself.    Drugs  will  only  make  this  or  that  un- 


10    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

ravelled  strand  behave  disproportionately.  You 
don't  want  that.  You  want  to  take  stock  of  your- 
self as  a  whole — find  out  where  you  stand." 

"But  the  Fuel  Commission?" 

"Is  it  sitting  now?" 

"Adjourned  till  after  Whitsuntide.  But  there 's 
heaps  of  work  to  be  done. 

1 ' Still,"  he  added,  "this  is  my  one  chance  of 
any  treatment. ' ' 

The  doctor  made  a  little  calculation.  "Three 
weeks.  ...    It's  scarcely  time  enough  to  begin." 

"You're  certain  that  no  regimen  of  carefully 
planned  and  chosen  tonics " 

"Dismiss  the  idea.  Dismiss  it."  He  decided  to 
take  a  plunge.  "I've  just  been  thinking  of  a 
little  holiday  for  myself.  But  I'd  like  to  see  you 
through  this.  And  if  I  am  to  see  you  through, 
there  ought  to  be  some  sort  of  beginning  now. 
In  this  three  weeks.    Suppose.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  leapt  to  his  thought.  "I'm  free 
to  go  anywhere. ' ' 

"Golf  would  drive  a  man  of  your  composition 
mad?" 

"It  would." 

"That's  that.    Still—.  .  .   The  country  must  be 

getting  beautiful  again  now, — after  all  the  rain 

we  have  had.  I  have  a  little  two-seater.  I  don't 
know.  .  .  .    The  repair  people  promise  to  release 

it  before  Friday. ' ' 


THE  CONSULTATION  11 

"But  /  have  a  choice  of  two  very  comfortable 
little  cars.    Why  not  be  my  guest?" 

"That  might  be  more  convenient." 

"I'd  prefer  my  own  car." 

"Then  what  do  you  say?" 

"I  agree.    Peripatetic  treatment." 

"South  and  west.  We  could  talk  on  the  road. 
In  the  evenings.  By  the  wayside.  We  might 
make  the  beginnings  of  a  treatment.  ...  A  sim- 
ple tour.  Nothing  elaborate.  You  wouldn't 
bring  a  man?" 

"I  always  drive  myself." 


§  3 

"There's  something  very  pleasant,"  said  the 
doctor,  envisaging  his  own  rash  proposal,  "in 
travelling  along  roads  you  don't  know  and  seeing 
houses  and  parks  and  villages  and  towns  for 
which  you  do  not  feel  in  the  slightest  degree  re- 
sponsible. They  hide  all  their  troubles  from  the 
road.  Their  backyards  are  tucked  away  out  of 
sight,  they  show  a  brave  face;  there's  none  of  the 
nasty  sell'  betrayals  of  the  railway  approach.  And 
everything  will  be  fresh  still.    There  will  still  be 

a  lot  of  apple  blossom — and  bluebells.  .  .  .  And 
all  the  while  we  can  be  getting  on  with  your 
affair." 


12  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  was  back  at  the  window  now.  "I  want  the 
holiday  myself,"  he  said. 

He  addressed  Sir  Richmond  over  his  shoulder. 
"Have  you  noted  how  fagged  and  unstable  every- 
body is  getting?    Everybody  intelligent,  I  mean." 

"It's  an  infernally  worrying  time." 

"Exactly.    Everybody  suffers." 

"It's  no  good  going  on  in  the  old  ways " 

"It  isn't.  And  it's  a  frightful  strain  to  get 
into  any  new  ways.    So  here  we  are. 

"A  man,"  the  doctor  expanded,  "isn't  a  crea- 
ture in  vacuo.  He's  himself  and  his  world.  He's 
a  surface  of  contact,  a  system  of  adaptations,  be- 
tween his  essential  self  and  his  surroundings. 
Well,  our  surroundings  have  become — how  shall 
I  put  it? — a  landslide.  The  war  which  seemed 
such  a  definable  catastrophe  in  1914  was,  after  all, 
only  the  first  loud  crack  and  smash  of  the  collapse. 
The  war  is  over  and — nothing  is  over.  This  peace 
is  a  farce,  reconstruction  an  exploded  phrase.  The 
slide  goes  on, — it  goes,  if  anything,  faster,  with- 
out a  sign  of  stopping.  And  all  our  poor  little 
adaptations!  Which  we  have  been  elaborating 
and  trusting  all  our  lives !  .  .  .  One  after  another 
they  fail  us.  We  are  stripped.  .  .  .  We  have  to 
begin  all  over  again.  ...  I'm  fifty-seven  and  I 
feel  at  times  nowadays  like  a  chicken  new  hatched 
in  a  thunderstorm." 

The  doctor  walked  towards  the  bookcase  and 
turned. 


THE  CONSULTATION  13 

" Everybody  is  like  that.  ...  It  isn't — what 
are  you  going  to  do?  It  isn't — what  am  I  going 
to  do?  It's — what  are  we  all  going  to  do?  .  .  . 
Lord !  How  safe  and  established  everything  was 
in  1910,  say.  We  talked  of  this  great  war  that  was 
coming,  but  nobody  thought  it  would  come.  We 
had  been  born  in  peace,  comparatively  speaking; 
we  had  been  brought  up  in  peace.  There  was  talk 
of  wars.  There  were  wars — little  wars — that  al- 
tered nothing  material.  .  .  .  Consols  used  to  be 
at  112  and  you  fed  your  household  on  ten  shillings 
a  head  a  week.  You  could  run  over  all  Europe, 
barring  Turkey  and  Russia,  without  even  a  pass- 
port. You  could  get  to  Italy  in  a  day.  Never 
were  life  and  comfort  so  safe — for  respectable 
people.  And  we  were  respectable  people.  .  .  . 
That  was  the  world  that  made  us  what  we  are. 
Thai  was  the  sheltering  and  friendly  greenhouse 
in  which  we  grew.  We  fitted  our  minds  to  that. 
.  .  .  And  here  we  are  with  the  greenhouse  fall- 
ing in  upon  as  Lump  by  lump,  smash  and  clatter, 
the  wild  winds  of  heaven  tearing  in  through  the 

ipa." 

Upstairs  on  Dr.  Martineau's  desk  lay  the 
typescript  of  tin'  opening  chapters  of  a  hook  that 
was  Intended  to  make  a  greal  splash  in  the  world, 
his  Psychology  of  a  New  Age.  Be  had  his  meta- 
phors ready. 

"We  said  :  'This  system  will  always  go  on.    We 

needn't  bother  abont  it.'    We  just  planned  our 


14  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

lives  accordingly.  It  was  like  a  bird  building  its 
nest  of  frozen  snakes.  My  father  left  me  a  decent 
independence.  I  developed  my  position;  I  have 
lived  between  here  and  the  hospital,  doing  good 
work,  enormously  interested,  prosperous,  mildly 
distinguished.  I  had  been  born  and  brought  up  on 
the  good  ship  Civilization.  I  assumed  that  some- 
one else  was  steering  the  ship  all  right.  I  never 
knew ;  I  never  enquired. ' ' 

"Nor  did  I,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  "but " 

"And  nobody  was  steering  the  ship,"  the  doc- 
tor went  on.  ' '  Nobody  had  ever  steered  the  ship. 
It  was  adrift." 

"I  realized  that.    I " 

"  It  is  a  new  realization.  Always  hitherto  men 
have  lived  by  faith — as  children  do,  as  the  animals 
do.  At  the  back  of  the  healthy  mind,  human  or 
animal,  has  been  this  persuasion:  "This  is  all 
right.  This  will  go  on.  If  I  keep  the  rule,  if  I 
do  so  and  so,  all  will  be  well.  I  need  not  trouble 
further;  things  are  cared  for.'  " 

"If  we  could  go  on  like  that!"  said  Sir 
Richmond. 

"We  can't.  That  faith  is  dead.  The  war — and 
the  peace — have  killed  it." 

The  doctor's  round  face  became  speculative. 
His  resemblance  to  the  full  moon  increased.  He 
seemed  +o  gaze  at  remote  things.  "It  may  very 
well  be  that  man  is  no  more  capable  of  living  out 
of  that  atmosphere  of  assurance  than  a  tadpole  is 


THE  CONSULTATION  15 

of  living  out  of  water.  His  mental  existence  may 
be  conditional  on  that.  Deprived  of  it  he  may  be- 
come incapable  of  sustained  social  life.  He  may 
become  frantically  self-seeking — incoherent  .  .  . 
a  stampede.  .  .  .  Human  sanity  may — disperse. 
"That's  our  trouble,"  the  doctor  completed. 
"Our  fundamental  trouble.  All  our  confidences 
and  our  accustomed  adaptations  are  destroyed. 
We  fit  together  no  longer.  We  are — loose.  We 
don't  know  where  we  are  nor  what  to  do.  The 
psychology  of  the  former  time  fails  to  give  safe 
responses,  and  the  psychology  of  the  New  Age 
has  still  to  develop." 

M 

"That  is  all  very  well,"  said  Sir  Richmond  in 
the  resolute  voice  of  one  who  will  be  pent  no 
longer.  "That  is  all  very  well  as  far  as  it  goes. 
But  it  does  not  cover  my  case.  I  am  not  suffering 
from  Lnadaptation.  I  have  adapted.  I  have 
thought  things  out.     I  think — much  as  you  do. 

Much  as  you  do.    So  it's  not  that.    But .   .  . 

Mind  you,  I  am  perfectly  clear  where  I  am.  Where 
we  are.  What  is  happening  to  us  all  is  the  break- 
up of  the  entire  system.  Agreed!  We  have  to 
make  another  system  or  perish  amidst  the  wreck- 
age. I  see  that  clearly.  Science  and  plan  have 
to  replace  custom  and  tradition  in  human  affairs. 
Soon.     Very  soon.    Granted.    Granted.    We  used 


16  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

to  say  all  that.  Even  before  the  war.  Now 
we  mean  it.  We've  muddled  about  in  the  old 
ways  overlong.  Some  new  sort  of  world,  planned 
and  scientific,  has  to  be  got  going.  Civilization  re- 
newed. Rebuilding  civilization — while  the  prem- 
ises are  still  occupied  and  busy.  It's  an  immense 
enterprise,  but  it  is  the  only  thing  to  be  done. 
In  some  ways  it's  an  enormously  attractive  en- 
terprise. Inspiring.  It  grips  my  imagination.  I 
think  of  the  other  men  who  must  be  at  work. 
Working  as  I  do  rather  in  the  dark  as  yet.  With 
whom  I  shall  presently  join  up.  .  .  .  The  attempt 
may  fail;  all  things  human  may  fail;  but  on  the 
other  hand  it  may  succeed.  I  never  had  such 
faith  in  anything  as  I  have  in  the  rightness  of  the 
work  I  am  doing  now.  I  begin  at  that.  But  here 
is  where  my  difficulty  comes  in.  The  top  of  my 
brain,  my  innermost  self  says  all  that  I  have  been 

saying,  but The  rest  of  me  won't  follow. 

The  rest  of  me  refuses  to  attend,  forgets,  strag- 
gles, misbehaves." 

"Exactly." 

The  word  irritated  Sir  Richmond.  "Not  'ex- 
actly' at  all.  'Amazingly,'  if  you  like.  ...  I 
have  this  unlimited  faith  in  our  present  tremen- 
dous necessity — for  work — for  devotion ;  I  believe 
my  share,  the  work  I  am  doing,  is  essential  to 
the  whole  thing — and  I  work  sluggishly.  I  work 
reluctantly.    I  work  damnably." 

"Exact "  The  doctor  checked  himself.  "All 


THE  CONSULTATION  17 

that  is  explicable.  Indeed  it  is.  Listen  for  a  mo- 
ment to  me!  Consider  what  you  are.  Consider 
what  we  are.  Consider  what  a  man  is  before  you 
marvel  at  his  ineptitudes  of  will.  Face  the  ac- 
cepted facts.  Here  is  a  creature  not  ten  thousand 
generations  from  the  ape,  his  ancestor.  Not  ten 
thousand.  And  that  ape  again,  not  a  score  of 
thousands  from  the  monkey,  his  forebear.  A  man's 
body,  his  bodily  powers,  are  just  the  body  and 
powers  of  an  ape,  a  little  improved,  a  little 
adapted  to  novel  needs.  That  brings  me  to  my 
point.  Can  his  mind  and  will  be  anything  better? 
For  a  few  generations,  a  few  hundreds  at  most, 
knowledge  and  wide  thought  have  flared  out  on 
the  darknesses  of  life.  .  .  .  But  the  substance 
of  man  is  ape  still.  He  may  carry  a  light  in  his 
brain,  but  his  instincts  move  in  the  darkness.  Out 
of  that  darkness  he  draws  his  motives." 

"Or  fails  to  draw  them,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Or  fails.  .  .  .  And  that  is  where  these  new 
methods  of  treatment  come  in.  We  explore  that 
failure.  Together.  What  the  psychoanalyst 
does — and  1  will  confess  that  I  owe  much  to  the 
psychoanalyst — what  lie  does  is  to  direct  thwarted, 
disappointed  and  perplexed  people  to  the  reali- 
ties of  their  own  nature.  Which  they  have 
been  accustomed  to  ignore  and  forget.  They  come 
to  us  with  high  ambitions  or  Lovely  illusions  about 
themselves,  torn,  shredded,  spoilt.  They  are  mor- 
ally denuded.     Dreams   they   hate   pursue  them; 


18    SECRET  PLACES  OP  THE  HEART 

abhorrent  desires  draw  them;  they  are  the  prey 
of  irresistible  yet  uncongenial  impulses ;  they  suc- 
cumb to  black  despairs.  The  first  thing  we  ask 
them  is  this :    '  What  else  could  you  expect  f '  " 

"What  else  could  I  expect?"  Sir  Richmond  re- 
peated, looking  down  on  him.    "H'm!" 

"The  wonder  is  not  that  you  are  sluggish,  re- 
luctantly unselfish,  inattentive,  spasmodic.  The 
wonder  is  that  you  are  ever  anything  else.  .  .  . 
Do  you  realize  that  a  few  million  generations  ago, 
everything  that  stirs  in  us,  everything  that  exalts 
human  life,  self-devotions,  heroisms,  the  utmost 
triumphs  of  art,  the  love — for  love  it  is — that 
makes  you  and  me  care  indeed  for  the  fate  and 
welfare  of  all  this  round  world,  was  latent  in 
the  body  of  some  little  lurking  beast  that  crawled 
and  hid  among  the  branches  of  vanished  and  for- 
gotten Mesozoic  trees?  A  petty  egg-laying, 
bristle-covered  beast  it  was,  with  no  more  of  the 
rudiments  of  a  soul  than  bare  hunger,  weak  lust 
and  fear.  .  .  .  People  always  seem  to  regard 
that  as  a  curious  fact  of  no  practical  importance. 
It  isn't:  it's  a  vital  fact  of  the  utmost  practical 
importance.  That  is  what  you  are  made  of.  Why 
should  you  expect — because  a  war  and  a  revolu- 
tion have  shocked  you — that  you  should  suddenly 
be  able  to  reach  up  and  touch  the  sky?" 

"H'm!"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "Have  I  been 
touching  the  sky?" 


THE  CONSULTATION  19 

"You  are  trying  to  play  the  part  of  an  honest 
rich  man." 

"I  don't  care  to  see  the  whole  system  go 
smash." 

"Exactly,"  said  the  doctor,  before  he  could  pre- 
vent himself. 

"But  is  it  any  good  to  tell  a  man  that  the  job 
he  is  attempting  is  above  him — that  he  is  just  a 
hairy  reptile  twice  removed — and  all  that  sort  of 
thing?" 

"Well,  it  saves  him  from  hoping  too  much  and 
being  too  greatly  disappointed.  It  recalls  him  to 
the  proportions  of  the  job.  He  gets  something 
done  by  not  attempting  everything.  .  .  .  And 
it  clears  him  up.  We  get  him  to  look  into  him- 
self, to  see  directly  and  in  measurable  terms  what 
it  is  that  puts  him  wrong  and  holds  him  back. 
He's  no  longer  vaguely  incapacitated.  He 
knows." 

"That's  diagnosis.    That's  not  treatment." 

"Treatment  by  diagnosis.  To  analyze  a  men- 
tal knol  is  lo  untie  it." 

"You  propose  thai  I  shall  spend  my  time,  until 
the  Commission  unci.-,  in  thinking  about  myself. 
...    I  wanted  to  forget  myself.*" 

"Like  a  man  who  tries  lo  forget  (hat  his  petrol 
i-  running  short  and  a  cylinder  missing  fire.  .  .  . 
No.  Come  back  to  I  he  question  of  what  you  are," 
said  the  doctor.    "A  creature  of  the  darkness  with 


20  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

new  lights.  Lit  and  half -blinded  by  science  and 
the  possibilities  of  controlling  the  world  that  it 
opens  out.  In  that  light  your  will  is  all  for  service ; 
you  care  more  for  mankind  than  for  yourself. 
You  begin  to  understand  something  of  the  self 
beyond  your  self.  But  it  is  a  partial  and  a  shaded 
light  as  yet ;  a  little  area  about  you  it  makes  clear, 
the  rest  is  still  the  old  darkness — of  millions  of 
intense  and  narrow  animal  generations.  .  .  .  You 
are  like  someone  who  awakens  out  of  an  imme- 
morial sleep  to  find  himself  in  a  vast  chamber,  in  a 
great  and  ancient  house,  a  great  and  ancient  house 
high  amidst  frozen  and  lifeless  mountains — in  a 
sunless  universe.  You  are  not  alone  in  it.  You 
are  not  lord  of  all  you  survey.  Your  leadership 
is  disputed.  The  darkness  even  of  the  room  you 
are  in  is  full  of  ancient  and  discarded  but  quite 
unsubjugated  powers  and  purposes.  .  .  .  They 
thrust  ambiguous  limbs  and  claws  suddenly  out  of 
the  darkness  into  the  light  of  your  attention.  They 
snatch  things  out  of  your  hand,  they  trip  your 
feet  and  jog  your  elbow.  They  crowd  and  cluster 
behind  you.  Wherever  your  shadow  falls,  they 
creep  right  up  to  you,  creep  upon  you  and  strug- 
gle to  take  possession  of  you.  The  souls  of  apes, 
monkeys,  reptiles  and  creeping  things  haunt  the 
passages  and  attics  and  cellars  of  this  living 
house  in  which  your  consciousness  has  awak- 
ened. ..." 

The  doctor  gave  this  quotation  from  his  unpub- 


THE  CONSULTATION  21 

lished  book  the  advantages  of  an  abrupt  break 
and  a  pause. 

Sir  Richmond  shrugged  his  shoulders  and 
smiled.  "And  you  propose  a  vermin  hunt  in  the 
old  tenement I" 

"The  modern  man  has  to  be  master  in  his  own 
house.  He  has  to  take  stock  and  know  what  is 
there." 

"Three  weeks  of  self  vivisection." 

"To  begin  with.  Three  weeks  of  perfect  hon- 
esty with  yourself.  As  an  opening.  ...  It  will 
take  longer  than  that  if  we  are  to  go  through  with 
the  job." 

"It's  a  considerable — process." 

"It  is." 

"Yet  you  shrink  from  simple  things  like 
drugs!" 

1 '  Self  -knowledge — without  anaesthetics. ' ' 

"Has  this  sort  of  thing  ever  done  anyone  any 
good  at  all?" 

"It  has  turned  hundreds  back  to  sanity  and 
steady  work." 

"How  frank  are  we  going  to  be?  How  full  are 
we  going  to  be?  Anyhow — we  can  break  off  at 
any  time.  .  .  .  Well  try  it.  We'll  try  it.  .  .  . 
And  so  for  this  journey  into  the  west  of  England. 
.  .  .  And — if  we  (-an  get  there — I'm  not  sure  that 
we  can  get  there — into  the  secret  places  of  my 
heart." 


CHAPTER  THE  SECOND 

LADY  HARDY 

The  patient  left  the  house  with  much  more  self- 
possession  than  he  had  shown  when  entering  it. 
Dr.  Martineau  had  thrus[t  him  back  from  his 
intenser  prepossessions  to  a  more  generalized 
view  of  himself,  had  made  his  troubles  objective 
and  detached  him  from  them.  He  could  even  find 
something  amusing  now  in  his  situation.  He  liked 
the  immense  scope  of  the  theoretical  duet  in 
which  they  had  indulged.  He  felt  that  most  of  it 
was  entirely  true — and,  in  some  untraceable  man- 
ner, absurd.  There  were  entertaining  possibilities 
in  the  prospect  of  the  doctor  drawing  him  out — he 
himself  partly  assisting  and  partly  resisting. 

He  was  a  man  of  extensive  reservations.  His 
private  life  was  in  some  respects  exceptionally 
private. 

"J  don't  confide.  ...  Do  I  even  confide  in  my- 
self? I  imagine  I  do.  ...  Is  there  anything  in 
myself  that  I  haven't  looked  squarely  in  the  face? 
.  .  .  How  much  are  we  going  into?  Even  as  re- 
gards facts? 

"Does  it  really  help  a  man — to  see  himself?  ..." 

22 


LADY  HARDY  23 

Such  thoughts  engaged  him  until  he  found  him- 
self in  his  study.  His  desk  and  his  writing  table 
were  piled  high  with  a  heavy  burthen  of  work. 
Still  a  little  preoccupied  with  Dr.  Martineau's 
exposition,  he  began  to  handle  this  confusion.  .  .  . 

At  half  past  nine  he  found  himself  with  three 
hours  of  good  work  behind  him.  It  had  seemed 
like  two.  He  had  not  worked  like  this  for  many 
weeks.  "This  is  very  cheering,"  he  said.  "And 
unexpected.  Can  old  Moon-face  have  hypnotized 
me  1  Anyhow —  .  .  .  Perhaps  I  Ve  only  imagined 
I  was  ill.  .  .  .  Dinner?"  He  looked  at  his  watch 
and  was  amazed  at  the  time.  "Good  Lord!  I've 
been  at  it  three  hours.  What  can  have  happened? 
Funny  I  didn't  hear  the  gong." 

He  went  downstairs  and  found  Lady  Hardy 
reading  a  magazine  in  a  dining-room  armchair 
and  finely  poised  between  devotion  and  martyr- 
dom. A  shadow  of  vexation  fell  athwart  his  mind 
at  the  sight  of  her. 

"  I  'd  no  idea  it  was  so  late, ' '  he  said.  ' '  I  heard 
no  gong." 

"After  you  swore  so  at  poor  Bradley  I  ordered 
that  there  should  he  no  gongs  when  we  were  alone. 
I  did  come  up  to  your  door  about  half  past  eight. 
I  crept  up.  But  I  was  afraid  I  might  upset  you 
if  I  cume  in." 

"But  you've  not  waited " 

"I've  had  a  mouthful  of  soup."  Lady  Hardy 
rang  the  bell. 


24    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"I've  done  some  work  at  last,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond, astride  on  the  hearthrug. 

"I'm  glad,"  said  Lady  Hardy,  without  glad- 
ness.   "I  waited  for  three  hours." 

Lady  Hardy  was  a  frail  little  blue-eyed  woman 
with  uneven  shoulders  and  a  delicate  sweet  pro- 
file. Hers  was  that  type  of  face  that  under  even 
the  most  pleasant  and  luxurious  circumstances 
still  looks  bravely  and  patiently  enduring.  Her 
refinement  threw  a  tinge  of  coarseness  over  his 
eager  consumption  of  his  excellent  clear  soup. 

"What's  this  fish,  Bradley?"  he  asked. 

"Turbot,  Sir  Richmond." 

"Don't  you  have  any?"  he  asked  his  wife. 

"I've  had  a  little  fish,"  said  Lady  Hardy. 

When  Bradley  was  out  of  the  room,  Sir  Rich- 
mond remarked:  "I  saw  that  nerves  man, 
Dr.  Martineau,  to-day.  He  wants  me  to  take  a 
holiday." 

The  quiet  patience  of  the  lady's  manner  intensi- 
fied. She  said  nothing.  A  flash  of  resentment  lit 
Sir  Richmond's  eyes.  When  he  spoke  again,  he 
seemed  to  answer  unspoken  accusations.  "Dr. 
Martineau 's  idea  is  that  he  should  come  with  me." 

The  lady  adjusted  herself  to  a  new  point  of 
view. 

"But  won't  that  be  reminding  you  of  your  ill- 
ness and  worries?" 

"He  seems  a  good  sort  of  fellow.  ...  I'm  in- 
clined to  like  him.    He'll  be  as  good  company  as 


LADY  HARDY  25 

anyone.  .  .  .  This  toumedos  looks  excellent. 
Have  some." 

"I  had  a  little  bird,"  said  Lady  Hardy,  "when 
I  found  you  weren't  coming." 

"But  I  say — don't  wait  here  if  you've  dined. 
Bradley  can  see  to  me." 

She  smiled  and  shook  her  head  with  the  quiet 
conviction  of  one  who  knew  her  duty  better. 
"Perhaps  I'll  have  a  little  ice  pudding  when  it 
comes,"  she  said. 

Sir  Richmond  detested  eating  alone  in  an  at- 
mosphere of  observant  criticism.  And  he  did  not 
like  talking  with  his  mouth  full  to  an  unembar- 
rassed interlocutor  who  made  no  conversational 
leads  of  her  own.  After  a  few  mouthfuls  he 
pushed  his  plate  away  from  him.  "Then  let's 
have  up  the  ice  pudding,"  he  said  with  a  faint 
note  of  bitterness. 

"But  have  you  finished V1 

"The  ice  pudding!"  he  exploded  wrathfully. 
"The  ice  pudding!" 

Lady  Hardy  sat  for  a  moment,  a  picture  of 
meek  dial  rees.  Then,  her  delicate  eyebrows  raised, 
and  tin-  corners  of  her  mouth  drooping,  she 
touched  the  button  of  the  silver  table-bell. 


CHAPTER  THE  THIRD 

THE  DEPARTURE 

No  wise  man  goes  out  upon  a  novel  expedition 
without  misgivings.  And  between  their  first  meet- 
ing and  the  appointed  morning  both  Sir  Richmond 
Hardy  and  Dr.  Martineau  were  the  prey  of  quite 
disagreeable  doubts  about  each  other,  themselves, 
and  the  excursion  before  them.  At  the  time  of 
their  meeting  each  had  been  convinced  that  he 
gauged  the  other  sufficiently  for  the  purposes  of 
the  proposed  tour.  Afterwards  each  found  him- 
self trying  to  recall  the  other  with  greater  dis- 
tinctness and  able  to  recall  nothing  but  queer, 
ominous  and  minatory  traits.  The  doctor's  impres- 
sion of  the  great  fuel  specialist  grew  ever  darker, 
leaner,  taller  and  more  impatient.  Sir  Richmond 
took  on  the  likeness  of  a  monster  obdurate  and 
hostile,  he  spread  upwards  until  like  the  Djinn  out 
of  the  bottle,  he  darkened  the  heavens.  And  he 
talked  too  much.  He  talked  ever  so  much  too 
much.  .  .  . 

Sir   Richmond   also   thought   that   the   doctor 

26 


THE  DEPARTURE  27 

talked  too  much.  In  addition,  he  read  into  his 
imperfect  memory  of  the  doctor's  face,  an  expres- 
sion of  protruded  curiosity.  What  was  all  this 
problem  of  motives  and  inclinations  that  they  were 
"going  into"  so  gaily?  He  had  merely  consulted 
the  doctor  on  a  simple,  straightforward  need  for 
a  nervous  tonic — that  was  what  he  had  needed — a 
tonic.  Instead  he  had  engaged  himself  for — he 
scarcely  knew  what — an  indiscreet,  indelicate,  and 
altogether  undesirable  experiment  in  confidences. 

Both  men  were  considerably  reassured  when  at 
last  they  set  eyes  on  each  other  again.  Indeed 
each  was  surprised  to  find  something  almost 
agreeable  in  the  appearance  of  the  other.  Dr. 
Martineau  at  once  perceived  that  the  fierceness  of 
Sir  Richmond  was  nothing  more  than  the  fierce- 
ness of  an  overwrought  man,  and  Sir  Richmond 
realized  at  a  glance  that  the  curiosity  of  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau'.s  bearing  had  in  it  nothing  personal  or 
base;  it  was  just  the  fine  alertness  of  the  scientific 
mind. 

Sir  Richmond  had  arrived  nearly  forty  minutes 
late  and  ii  would  have  been  evidenl  to  a  much  less 
highly  trained  observer  than  \)r.  Martineau  that 
some  dissension  had  arisen  between  the  little,  lady- 
like, cream  and  black  Charmeuse  car  and  its 
owner.  There  was  a  faint  air  of  resentment  and 
protest  between  them.  As  if  Sir  Richmond  had 
been  in  some  way  rude  to  it. 

The  cap  of  the   radiator  wras  adorned  with  a 


28  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

little  brass  figure  of  a  flying  Mercury.  Frozen 
in  a  sprightly  attitude,  its  stiff  bound  and  its  fixed 
heavenward  stare  was  highly  suggestive  'of  a 
forced  and  tactful  disregard  of  current  unpleas- 
antness. 

Nothing  was  said,  however,  to  confirm  or  dispel 
this  suspicion  of  a  disagreement  between  the  man 
and  the  car.  Sir  Richmond  directed  and  assisted 
Dr.  Martineau  's  man  to  adjust  the  luggage  at  the 
back,  and  Dr.  Martineau  watched  the  proceedings 
from  his  dignified  front  door.  He  was  wearing  a 
suit  of  fawn  tweeds,  a  fawn  Homburg  hat  and  a 
light  Burberry,  with  just  that  effect  of  special 
preparation  for  a  holiday  which  betrays  the  habit- 
ually busy  man.  Sir  Richmond 's  brown  gauntness 
was,  he  noted,  greatly  set  off  by  his  suit  of  grey. 
There  had  certainly  been  some  sort  of  quarrel. 
Sir  Richmond  was  explaining  the  straps  to  Dr. 
Martineau 's  butler  with  the  coldness  a  man  be- 
trays when  he  explains  the  uncongenial  habits  of 
some  unloved  intimate.  And  when  the  moment 
came  to  start  and  the  little  engine  did  not  imme- 
diately respond  to  the  electric  starter,  he  said: 
1  *  Oh !    Come  up,  you ! ' ' 

His  voice  sank  at  the  last  word  as  though  it  was 
an  entirely  confidential  communication  to  the  lit- 
tle car.  And  it  was  an  extremely  low  and  dis- 
agreeable word.  So  Dr.  Martineau  decided  that 
it  was  not  his  business  to  hear  it.  .  .  . 

It  was  speedily  apparent  that  Sir  Richmond  was 


THE  DEPARTURE  29 

an  experienced  and  excellent  driver.  He  took  the 
Charmeuse  out  into  the  traffic  of  Baker  Street  and 
westward  through  brisk  and  busy  streets  and 
roads  to  Brentford  and  Hounslow  smoothly  and 
swiftly,  making  a  score  of  unhesitating  and  ac- 
curate decisions  without  apparent  thought.  There 
was  very  little  conversation  until  they  were 
through  Brentford.  Near  Shepherd's  Bush,  Sir 
Richmond  had  explained,  "This  is  not  my  own 
particular  car.  That  was  butted  into  at  the  ga- 
rage this  morning  and  its  radiator  cracked.  So  I 
had  to  fall  back  on  this.  It's  quite  a  good  little 
car.  In  its  way.  My  wife  drives  it  at  times.  It 
has  one  or  two  constitutional  weaknesses — inci- 
dental to  the  make — gear-box  over  the  back  axle 
for  example — gets  all  the  vibration.  Whole  ma- 
chine rather  on  the  flimsy  side.    Still " 

He  left  the  topic  at  that. 

Dr.  Marl  in ci  n  said  something  of  no  consequence 
aboul  its  being  a  very  comfortable  little  car. 

Somewhere  between  Brentford  and  Hounslow, 
Sir  Richmond  plunged  into  the  matter  between 
them.  "  I  don't  know  how  deep  we  are  going  into 
these  psychological  probings  of  yours,"  he  said. 
"But  I  donlij  wry  much  if  wo  shall  get  anything 
out  of  thorn." 

"Probably  not,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 

"After  all,  what   I  want  is  a  tonio.     F  don't  see 

that  there  is  anything  positively  wrong  with  me. 
A  certain  lack  of  energy " 


30    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

' '  Lack  of  balance, ' '  corrected  the  doctor.  * '  You 
are  wasting  energy  upon  internal  friction." 

"But  isn't  that  inevitable?  No  machine  is  per- 
fectly efficient.  No  man  either.  There  is  always 
a  waste.  Waste  of  the  type ;  waste  of  the  individ- 
ual idiosyncrasy.  This  little  car,  for  instance, 
isn't  pulling  as  she  ought  to  pull — she  never  does. 
She's  low  in  her  class.  So  with  myself;  there  is 
a  natural  and  necessary  high  rate  of  energy 
waste.  Moods  of  apathy  and  indolence  are  nat- 
ural to  me.  (Damn  that  omnibus !  All  over  the 
road!)" 

"We  don't  deny  the  imperfection "  began 

the  doctor. 

"One  has  to  fit  oneself  to  one's  circumstances," 
said  Sir  Richmond,  opening  up  another  line  of 
thought. 

"We  don't  deny  the  imperfection,"  the  doctor 
stuck  to  it.  ' '  These  new  methods  of  treatment  are 
based  on  the  idea  of  imperfection.  We  begin  with 
that.    I  began  with  that  last  Tuesday.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond,  too,  was  sticking  to  his  argu- 
ment. "A  man,  and  for  that  matter  the  world  he 
lives  in,  is  a  tangle  of  accumulations.  Your 
psychoanalyst  starts,  it  seems  to  me,  with  a  no- 
tion of  stripping  down  to  something  fundamental. 
The  ape  before  us  was  a  tangle  of  accumulations, 
just  as  we  are.  So  it  was  with  his  forebears.  So 
it  has  always  been.  All  life  is  an  endless  tangle 
of  accumulations." 


THE  DEPARTURE  31 

"Recognize  it,"  said  the  doctor. 

"And  then?"  said  Sir  Richmond,  controver- 
sially. 

"Recognize  in  particular  your  own  tangle." 

"Is  my  particular  tangle  very  different  from  the 
general  tangle ?  (Oh!  Damn  this  feeble  little  en- 
gine!) I  am  a  creature  of  undecided  will,  urged 
on  by  my  tangled  heredity  to  do  a  score  of  entirely 
incompatible  things.    Mankind,  all  life,  is  that." 

"But  our  concern  is  the  particular  score  of  in- 
compatible things  you  are  urged  to  do.  We  ex- 
amine and  weigh We  weigh " 

The  doctor  wasjstill  saying  these  words  when  a 
violent  and  ultimately  disastrous  struggle  began 
between  Sir  Richmond  and  the  little  Charmeuse 
car.    The  doctor  stopped  in  mid-sentence. 

It  was  near  Taplow  station  that  the  mutual  ex- 
asperation of  man  and  machine  was  brought  to  a 
crisis  by  the  clumsy  ('mergence  of  a  laundry  cart 
from  a  side  road.  Sir  Richmond  was  obliged  to 
pull  up  smartly  and  stopped  his  engine.  It 
refused  an  immediate  obedience  to  the  electric 
starter.  Then  it  picked  up,  Paced  noisily,  disen- 
gaged great  volumes  of  bluish  smoke,  and  dis- 
played an  unaccountable  indisposition  to  run  on 
any  gear  bn1  the  lowest.  Sir  Richmond  thought 
aloud,  unpleasing  thoughts.  He  addressed  the  lit- 
tle car  as  a  person  ;  he  referred  to  ancienl  disputes 
and  temperamental  incompatibilities.  His  anger 
betrayed  him  a  coarse,  ill-bred  man.     The  little 


32  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

car  quickened  under  his  reproaches.  There  were 
some  moments  of  hope,  dashed  by  the  necessity  of 
going  dead  slow  behind  an  interloping  van.  Sir 
Richmond  did  not  notice  the  outstretched  arm  of 
the  driver  of  the  van,  and  stalled  his  engine  for  a 
second  time.  The  electric  starter  refused  its  office 
altogether. 

For  some  moments  Sir  Eichmond  sat  like  a  man 
of  stone. 

"I  must  wind  it  up,"  he  said  at  last  in  a  pro- 
found and  awful  voice.    ' '  I  must  wind  it  up. ' ' 

"I  get  out,  don't  I?"  asked  the  doctor,  unan- 
swered, and  did  so.  Sir  Richmond,  after  a  grim 
search  and  the  displacement  and  replacement  of 
the  luggage,  produced  a  handle  from  the  locker  at 
the  back  of  the  car  and  prepared  to  wind. 

There  was  a  little  difficulty.  ' '  Come  up!"  he  said, 
and  the  small  engine  roared  out  like  a  stage  lion. 

The  two  gentlemen  resumed  their  seats.  The 
car  started  and  then  by  an  unfortunate  inadvert- 
ency Sir  Richmond  pulled  the  gear  lever  over  from 
the  first  speed  to  the  reverse.  There  was  a  metallic 
clangour  beneath  the  two  gentlemen,  and  the  car 
slowed  down  and  stopped  although  the  engine 
was  still  throbbing  wildly,  and  the  dainty  veil  of 
blue  smoke  still  streamed  forward  from  the  back 
of  the  car  before  a  gentle  breeze.  The  doctor  got 
out  almost  precipitately,  followed  by  a  gaunt  mad- 
man, mouthing  vileness,  who  had  only  a  minute 
or  so  before  been  a  decent  British  citizen.     He 


THE  DEPARTURE  33 

made  seme  blind  lunges  at  the  tremulous  but  ob- 
durate car,  but  rather  as  if  he  looked  for  offences 
and  accusations  than  for  displacements  to  adjust. 
Quivering  and  refusing,  the  little  car  was  ex- 
traordinarily like  some  recalcitrant  little  old  aris- 
tocratic lady  in  the  hands  of  revolutionaries,  and 
this  made  the  behaviour  of  Sir  Eichmond  seem 
even  more  outrageous  than  it  would  otherwise 
have  done.  He  stopped  the  engine,  he  went  down 
on  his  hands  and  knees  in  the  road  to  peer  up  at 
the  gear-box,  then  without  restoring  the  spark, 
he  tried  to  wind  up  the  engine  again.  He  spun  the 
little  handle  with  an  insane  violence,  faster  and 
faster  for — as  it  seemed  to  the  doctor — the  better 
part  of  a  minute.  Beads  of  perspiration  appeared 
upon  his  brow  and  ran  together;  he  bared  his  teeth 
in  a  snarl;  his  hat  slipped  over  one  eye.  He 
groaned  with  rage.  Then,  using  the  starting 
handle  as  a  club,  he  assailed  the  car.  He  smote 
the  brazen  Mercury  from  its  foothold  and  sent  it 
and  a  part  of  the  radiator  cap  with  it  flying  across 
the  road.  He  beat  at  the  wings  of  the  bonnet,  until 
they  bent  in  under  his  blows.  Finally,  he  hurled 
the  starting-handle  at  the  wind-screen  and 
smashed  it.  The  starting-handle  rattled  over  the 
bonnet  and  fell  to  the  ground.  .  .  . 

The  paroxysm  was  over.  Ten  seconds  later  this 
cataclysmal  lunatic;  had  reverted  to  sanity — a 
rather  sheepish  sanity. 

He  thrust  his  hands  into  his  trouser  pockets 


34  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

and  turned  his  back  on  the  car.  He  remarked  in  a 
voice  of  melancholy  detachment :  "It  was  a  mis- 
take to  bring  that  coupe." 

Dr.  Martineau  had  assumed  an  attitude  of 
trained  observation  on  the  side  path.  His  hands 
rested  on  his  hips  and  his  hat  was  a  little  on  one 
side.  He  was  inclined  to  agree  with  Sir  Richmond. 
"I  don't  know,"  he  considered.  "You  wanted 
some  such  blow-off  as  this." 

"Did  I?" 

' '  The  energy  you  have !  That  car  must  be  some- 
body 's  whipping  boy. ' ' 

"The  devil  it  is!"  said  Sir  Richmond,  turning 
round  sharply  and  staring  at  it  as  if  he  expected 
it  to  display  some  surprising  and  yet  familiar 
features.  Then  he  looked  questioningly  and  sus- 
piciously at  his  companion. 

' '  These  outbreaks  do  nothing  to  amend  the  orig- 
inating grievance,"  said  the  doctor.  "No.  And 
at  times  they  are  even  costly.  But  they  certainly 
lift  a  burthen  from  the  nervous  system.  .  .  .  And 
now  I  suppose  we  have  to  get  that  little  ruin  to 
Maidenhead." 

"Little  ruin!"  repeated  Sir  Richmond.  "No. 
There's  lots  of  life  in  the  little  beast  yet." 

He  reflected.  "She'll  have  to  be  towed."  He 
felt  in  his  breast  pocket.  "Somewhere  I  have 
the  R.A.C.  order  paper,  the  Badge  that  will  Get 
You  Home.  We  shall  have  to  hail  some  passing 
car  to  take  it  into  Maidenhead." 


THE  DEPARTURE  35 

Dr.  Martineau  offered  and  Sir  Richmond  took 
and  lit  a  cigarette. 

For  a  little  while  conversation  hung  fire.  Then 
for  the  first  time  Dr.  Martineau  heard  his  patient 
laugh. 

''Amazing  savage  1"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
1 '  Amazing  savage ! ' ' 

He  pointed  to  his  handiwork.  "The  little  car 
looks  ruffled.    "Well  it  may." 

He  became  grave  again.  "I  suppose  I  ought  to 
apologize." 

Dr.  Martineau  weighed  the  situation.  "As  be- 
tween doctor  and  patient,"  he  said.    "No." 

"Oh!"  said  Sir  Richmond,  turned  to  a  new 
point  of  view.  "But  where  the  patient  ends  and 
the  host  begins.  ...  I'm  really  very  sorry." 

He  reverted  to  his  original  train  of  thought 
which  had  not  concerned  Dr.  Martineau  at  all. 
"After  all,  the  little  car  was  only  doing  what  she 
was  made  to  do." 

The  affair  of  the  car  effectively  unsealed  Sir 
Richmond's  mind.  Hitherto  Dr.  Martineau  had 
perceived  the  possibility  and  danger  of  a  defen- 
sive silence  or  of  a  still  more  defensive  irony;  but 
now  that  Sir  Richmond  had  once  given  himself 
away,  he  seemed  prepared  to  give  himself  away 
to  an  unlimited  extent.  He  embarked  upon  an 
apologetic  discussion  of  the  choleric  temperament. 


36  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  began  as  they  stood  waiting  for  the  relief 
car  from  the  Maidenhead  garage.  ' '  You  were  talk- 
ing of  the  ghosts  of  apes  and  monkeys  that  sud- 
denly come  out  from  the  darkness  of  the  sub- 
conscious. ..." 

"You  mean — when  we  first  met  at  Harley 
Street?" 

"That  last  apparition  of  mine  seems  to  have 
been  a  gorilla  at  least." 

The  doctor  became  precise.  "Gorillaesque. 
We  are  not  descended  from  gorillas." 

"Queer  thing  a  fit  of  rage  is!" 

"It's  one  of  nature's  cruder  expedients.  Crude, 
but  I  doubt  if  it  is  fundamental.  There  doesn't 
seem  to  be  rage  in  the  vegetable  world,  and  even 

among  the  animals f    No,  it  is  not  universal." 

He  ran  his  mind  over  classes  and  orders.  "Wasps 
and  bees  certainly  seem  to  rage,  but  if  one  comes 
to  think,  most  of  the  invertebrata  show  very  few 
signs  of  it." 

"I'm  not  so  sure,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "I've 
never  seen  a  snail  in  a  towering  passion  or  an 
oyster  slamming  its  shell  behind  it.  But  these 
are  sluggish  things.  Oysters  sulk,  which  is  after 
all  a  smouldering  sort  of  rage.  And  take  any 
more  active  invertebrate.  Take  a  spider.  Not  a 
smashing  and  swearing  sort  of  rage  perhaps,  but  a 
disciplined,  cold-blooded  malignity.  .  .  .     Crabs 


THE  DEPARTURE  37 

fight.  ...  A  conger  eel  in  a  boat  will  rage — 
dangerously." 

"A  vertebrate.  Yes.  But  even  among  the  verte- 
brata;  who  has  ever  seen  a  furious  rabbit?" 

"  Don't  the  bucks  fight?"  questioned  Sir 
Richmond. 

Dr.  Martineau  admitted  the  point. 

"I've  always  had  these  fits  of  passion.  As  far 
back  as  I  can  remember.  I  was  a  kicking,  scream- 
ing child.  I  threw  things.  I  once  threw  a  fork  at 
my  elder  brother  and  it  stuck  in  his  forehead, 
doing  no  serious  damage — happily.  There  were 
whole  days  of  wrath — days,  as  I  remember  them. 
Perhaps  they  were  only  hours.  ...  I've  never 
thought  before  what  a  peculiar  thing  all  this  rag- 
ing is  in  the  world.  Why  do  we  rage?  They  used 
to  say  it  was  the  devil.  If  it  isn't  the  devil,  then 
what  the  devil  is  it? 

"After  all,"  he  wont  on  as  the  doctor  was  about 
to  answer  his  question;  "as  you  pointed  out,  it 
isn't  the  lowlier  things  that  rage.  It's  the  higher 
things  and  us." 

''The  devil  nowadays,"  the  doctor  reflected 
after  a  pause,  "bo  far  as  man  is  concerned,  is 
understood  to  be  the  ancestral  ape.  And  more 
particularly  the  old  male  ape." 

But  Sir  Richmond  was  away  on  another  line 
of  thought.  "life  if  self,  flaring  out.  Brooking 
no  contradiction."     lie  came  round  suddenly  to 


38  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  doctor's  qualification.     "Why  male?     Don't 
little  girls  smash  things  just  as  much?" 

1 '  They  don 't, ' '  said  Dr.  Martineau.  ' '  Not  nearly 
as  much." 

Sir  Eichmond  went  off  at  a  tangent  again.  "I 
suppose  you  have  watched  any  number  of  babies  V* 

''Not  nearly  as  many  as  a  general  practitioner 
would  do.  There's  a  lot  of  rage  about  most  of 
them  at  first,  male  or  female. ' ' 

"Queer  little  eddies  of  fury.  .  .  .  Recently — it 
happens — I've  been  seeing  one.  A  spit  of  red 
wrath,  clenching  its  fists  and  squalling  threats  at 
a  damned  disobedient  universe." 

The  doctor  was  struck  by  an  idea  and  glanced 
quickly  and  questioningly  at  his  companion's 
profile. 

"Blind  driving  force,"  said  Sir  Richmond, 
musing. 

"Isn't  that  after  all  what  we  really  are?"  he 
asked  the  doctor.  "Essentially — Rage.  A  rage  in 
dead  matter,  making  it  alive." 

"Schopenhauer,"  footnoted  the  doctor.- 
"Boehme." 

1 '  Plain  fact, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond.  ' '  No  Rage — 
no  Go." 

"But  rage  without  discipline?" 

"Discipline  afterwards.     The  rage  first." 

"But  rage  against  what?    And  for  what?" 

"Against  the  Universe.    And  for ?    That's 

more  difficult.    What  is  the  little  beast  squalling 


THE  DEPARTURE  39 

itself  crimson  for?    Ultimately?  .  .  .  What  is  it 
clutching  after?     In  the  long  run,  what  will  it 

get?" 

("Yours  the  car  in  distress  what  sent  this?" 
asked  an  unheeded  voice.) 

"Of  course,  if  you  were  to  say  'desire',"  said 
Dr.  Martineau, ' '  then  you  would  be  in  line  with  the 
psychoanalysts.  They  talk  of  libido,  meaning  a 
sort  of  fundamental  desire.  Jung  speaks  of  it  at 
times  almost  as  if  it  were  the  universal  driving 
force." 

"No,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  in  love  with  his  new 
idea.  "Not  desire.  Desire  would  have  a  definite 
direction,  and  that  is  just  what  this  driving  force 
hasn't.    It's  rage." 

"Yours  the  car  in  distress  what  sent  this?"  the 
voice  repeated.  It  was  the  voice  of  a  mechanic 
in  an  Overland  car.  He  was  holding  up  the  blue 
request  for  assistance  that  Sir  Richmond  had  re- 
cently filled  in. 

The  two  philosophers  returned  to  practical 
matters. 

For  half  an  hour  after  the  departure  of  the  little 
Channelise  car  with  Sir  Iiiclunond  and  Dr.  Mar- 
tinoau,  the  brass  Mercury  lay  unheeded   in  the 

dusty  roadside  grass.     Then   it  caught  the  eye 
of  a  passing  child. 


40  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  was  a  bright  little  boy  of  five.  From  the 
moment  when  he  caught  the  gleam  of  brass  he 
knew  that  he  had  made  the  find  of  his  life.  But 
his  nurse  was  a  timorous,  foolish  thing.  "You 
did  ought  to  of  left  it  there,  Masterrarry,"  she 
said. 

"Findings  ain't  keepings  nowadays,  not  by  no 
manner  of  means,  Masterrarry. 

"Yeiv'd  look  silly  if  a  policeman  came  along 
arsting  people  if  they  seen  a  goldennimage. 

"Arst  yer  'ow  you  come  by  it  and  look  pretty 
straight  at  you. ' ' 

All  of  which  grumblings  Master  Harry  treated 
with  an  experienced  disregard.  He  knew  defi- 
nitely that  he  would  never  relinquish  this  bright 
and  lovely  possession  again.  It  was  the  first  beau- 
tiful thing  he  had  ever  possessed.  He  was  the 
darling  of  fond  and  indulgent  parents  and  his  nur- 
sery was  crowded  with  hideous  rag  and  sawdust 
dolls,  golliwogs,  comic  penguins,  comic  lions,  comic 
elephants  and  comic  policemen  and  every  variety 
of  suchlike  humorous  idiocy  and  visual  beastliness. 
This  figure,  solid,  delicate  and  gracious,  was  a 
thing  of  a  different  order. 

There  was  to  be  much  conflict  and  distress, 
tears  and  wrath,  before  the  affinity  of  that  clean- 
limbed, shining  figure  and  his  small  soul  was 
recognized.  But  he  carried  his  point  at  last.  The 
Mercury  became  his  inseparable  darling,  his  sym- 


THE  DEPARTURE  41 

bol,  his  private  god,  the  one  dignified  and  serious 
thing  in  a  little  life  much  congested  by  the  quaint, 
the  burlesque,  and  all  the  smiling,  dull  condescen- 
sions of  adult  love. 


CHAPTER   THE   FOURTH 

AT  MAIDENHEAD 
§    1 

The  little  Charmeuse  was  towed  to  hospital  and 
the  two  psychiatrists  took  up  their  quarters  at 
the  Radiant  Hotel  with  its  pleasant  lawns  and 
graceful  landing  stage  at  the  bend  towards  the 
bridge.  Sir  Richmond,  after  some  trying  work 
at  the  telephone,  got  into  touch  with  his  own 
proper  car.  A  man  would  bring  that  down  in  two 
days'  time  at  latest,  and  afterwards  the  detested 
coupe  could  go  back  to  London.  The  day  was 
still  young,  and  after  lunch  and  coffee  upon  a 
sunny  lawn  a  boat  seemed  indicated.  Sir  Rich- 
mond astonished  the  doctor  by  going  to  his  room, 
reappearing  dressed  in  tennis  flannels  and  look- 
ing very  well  in  them.  It  occurred  to  the  doctor 
as  a  thing  hitherto  unnoted  that  Sir  Richmond 
was  not  indifferent  to  his  personal  appearance. 
The  doctor  had  no  flannels,  but  he  had  brought 
a  brown  holland  umbrella  lined  with  green  that  he 
had  acquired  long  ago  in  Algiers,  and  this  served 
to  give  him  something  of  the  riverside  quality. 

The  day  was  full  of  sunshine  and  the'river  had  a 
May  time  animation.  Pink  geraniums,  vivid  green 
lawns,  gay  awnings,  bright  glass,  white  paint  and 

42 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  43 

shining  metal  set  the  tone  of  Maidenhead  life. 
At  lunch  there  had  been  five  or  six  small  tables 
with  quietly  affectionate  couples  who  talked  in 
undertones,  a  tableful  of  bright-coloured  Jews  who 
talked  in  overtones,  and  a  family  party  from  the 
Midlands,  badly  smitten  with  shyness,  who  did  not 
talk  at  all.  "A  resort  of  honeymoon  couples," 
said  the  doctor,  and  then  rather  knowingly : ' '  Tem- 
porary honeymoons,  I  fancy,  in  one  or  two  of  the 
cases." 

" Decidedly  temporary,"  said  Sir  Richmond, 
considering  the  company — "in  most  of  the  cases 
anyhow.  The  two  in  the  corner  might  be  mar- 
ried.   You  never  know  nowadays." 

He  beca>me  reflective.  .  .  . 

After  lunch  and  coffee  he  rowed  the  doctor  up 
the  river  towards  Cliveden. 

"The  last  time  I  was  here,"  he  said,  return- 
ing to  the  subject,  "I  was  here  on  a  temporary 
honeymoon." 

The  doctor  tried  to  look  as  though  he  had  not 
thought  that  could  be  possible. 

"I  know  my  Maidenhead  fairly  well,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.  "Aquatic  activities,  such  as  rowing, 
punting,  messing  about  with  a  boat-hook,  fcying- 
up,  buzzing  about  in  motor  launches,  fouling  other 
people's  boats,  are  merely  the  stage  business  of 
the  drama.  The  ruling  interests  of  this  place  are 
love — largely  illicit — and  persistent  drinking.  .  .  . 
Don't  you  think  the  bridge  charming  from  here?" 


44    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"I  shouldn't  have  thought — drinking,"  said 
Dr.  Martineau,  after  he  had  done  justice  to  the 
bridge  over  his  shoulder. 

"Yes,  the  place  has  a  floating  population  of 
quiet  industrious  soakers.  The  incurable  river 
man  and  the  river  girl  end  at  that." 

Dr.  Martineau  encouraged  Sir  Richmond  by  an 
appreciative  silence. 

"If  we  are  to  explore  the  secret  places  of  the 
heart,"  Sir  Richmond  went  on,  "we  shall  have 
to  give  some  attention  to  this  Maidenhead  side  of 
life.  It  is  very  material  to  my  case.  I  have, — as 
I  have  said — been  here.  This  place  has  beauty  and 
charm;  these  piled-up  woods  behind  which  my 
Lords  Astor  and  Desborough  keep  their  state,  this 
shining  mirror  of  the  water,  brown  and  green  and 
sky  blue,  this  fringe  of  reeds  and  scented  rushes 
and  forget-me-not  and  lilies,  and  these  perpetually 
posing  white  swans :  they  make  a  picture.  A  little 
artificial  it  is  true;  one  feels  the  presence  of  a 
Conservancy  Board,  planting  the  rushes  and  in- 
dustriously nicking  the  swans;  but  none  the  less 
delightful.  And  this  setting  has  appealed  to  a 
number  of  people  as  an  invitation,  as,  in  a  way,  a 
promise.  They  come  here,  responsive  to  that 
promise  of  beauty  and  happiness.  They  conceive 
of  themselves  here,  rowing  swiftly  and  grace- 
fully, punting  beautifully,  brandishing  boat-hooks 
with  ease  and  charm.  They  look  to  meet,  under 
pleasant  or  romantic  circumstances,  other  posses- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  45 

sors  and  worshippers  of  grace  and  beauty  here. 
There  will  be  glowing  evenings,  warm  moonlight, 
distant  voices  singing.  .  .  .  There  is  your  desire, 
doctor,  the  desire  you  say  is  the  driving  force  of 
life.  But  reality  mocks  it.  Boats  bump  and  lead 
to  coarse  ungracious  quarrels;  rowing  can  be 
curiously  fatiguing;  punting  involves  dreadful 
indignities.  The  romance  here  tarnishes  very 
quickly.  Romantic  encounters  fail  to  occur ;  in  our 
impatience  we  resort  to — accosting.  Chilly  mists 
arise  from  the  water  and  the  magic  of  distant 
singing  is  provided,  even  excessively,  by  boatloads 
of  cads — with  collecting  dishes.  When  the  weather 
keeps  warm  there  presently  arises  an  extraordi- 
nary multitude  of  gnats,  and  when  it  does  not 
there  is  a  need  for  stimulants.  That  is  why  the 
dreamers  who  come  here  first  for  a  light  delicious 
brush  with  love,  come  down  at  last  to  the  Thames- 
side  barmaid  with  her  array  of  spirits  and  cordials 
as  the  quintessence  of  all  desire." 

"I  say,"  said  the  doctor.  "You  tear  the  place 
to  pieces." 

"The  desires  of  the  place,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I'm  using  the  place  as  a  symbol." 

He  held  liis  sculls  awash,  rippling  in  the  water. 

"The  real  force  of  life,  the  rage  of  life,  isn't 
here,"  he  said.  "It's  down  underneath,  sulking 
and  smouldering.  Every  now  and  then  it  strains 
and  cracks  the  surface.  This  stretch  of  the 
Thames,  this  pleasure  stretch,  has  in  fact  a  curi- 


46    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

ously  quarrelsome  atmosphere.  People  scold  and 
insult  one  another  for  the  most  trivial  things,. for 
passing  too  close,  for  taking  the  wrong  side,  for 
tying  up  or  floating  loose.  Most  of  these  notice 
boards  on  the  bank  show  a  thoroughly  nasty  spirit. 
People  on  the  banks  jeer  at  anyone  in  the  boats. 
You  hear  people  quarrelling  in  boats,  in  the  ho- 
tels, as  they  walk  along  the  towing  path.  There 
is  remarkably  little  happy  laughter  here.  The 
rage,  you  see,  is  hostile  to  this  place,  the  rage 
breaks  through.  .  .  .  The  people  who  drift  from 
one  pub  to  another,  drinking,  the  people  who  fud- 
dle in  the  riverside  hotels,  are  the  last  fugitives  of 
pleasure,  trying  to  forget  the  rage.  ..." 

"Isn't  it  that  there  is  some  greater  desire  at 
the  back  of  the  human  mind?"  the  doctor  sug- 
gested. "Which  refuses  to  be  content  with  pleas- 
ure as  an  end?" 

"What  greater  desire?"  asked  Sir  Richmond, 
disconcertingly. 

"Oh!  .  .  ."    The  doctor  cast  about. 

"There  is  no  such  greater  desire,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.  ' '  You  cannot  name  it.  It  is  just  blind 
drive.  I  admit  its  discontent  with  pleasure  as  an 
end — but  has  it  any  end  of  its  own?  At  the  most 
you  can  say  that  the  rage  in  life  is  seeking  its 
desire  and  hasn't  found  it." 

"Let  us  help  in  the  search,"  said  the  doctor, 
with  an  afternoon  smile  under  his  green  umbrella. 
"Goon." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  47 


§2 

" Since  our  first  talk  in  Harley  Street,"  said  Sir 
Richmond,  "I  have  been  trying  myself  over  in 
my  mind.    (We  can  drift  down  this  backwater.)  " 

"Big  these  trees  are,"  said  the  doctor  with 
infinite  approval. 

"I  am  astonished  to  discover  what  a  bundle  of 
discordant  motives  I  am.  I  do  not  seem  to  de- 
serve to  be  called  a  personality.  I  cannot  discover 
even  a  general  direction.  Much  more  am  I  like  a 
taxi-cab  in  which  all  sorts  of  aims  and  desires  have 
travelled  to  their  destination  and  got  out.  Are 
we  all  like  that?" 

"A  bundle  held  together  by  a  name  and  address 
and  a  certain  thread  of  memory?"  said  the  doc- 
tor and  considered.  "More  than  that.  More  than 
that.  We  have  leading  ideas,  associations,  pos- 
sessions, liabilities." 

"We  build  ourselves  a  prison  of  circumstances 
that  keeps  us  from  complete  dispersal." 

"Exactly,"  said  the  doctor.  "And  there  is  also 
something,  a  consistency,  that  we  call  character." 

"It  changes." 

"Consistently  with  itself." 

"I  have  been  trying  to  recall  my  sexual  his- 
tory," said  Sir  Richmond,  going  <>ff  at  a  tangent. 
"My  sentimental  education.  I  wonder  if  il  differs 
very  widely  from  yours  or  most  men's." 


48    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"Some  men  are  more  eventful  in  these  mat- 
ters than  others,"  said  the  doctor, — it  sounded — 
wistfully. 

"They  have  the  same  jumble  of  motives  and 
traditions,  I  suspect,  whether  they  are  eventful  or 
not.  The  brakes  may  be  strong  or  weak  but  the 
drive  is  the  same.  I  can't  remember  much  of  the 
beginnings  of  curiosity  and  knowledge  in  these 
matters.    Can  you?" 

"Not  much,"  said  the  doctor.    "No." 

1 '  Your  psychoanalysts  tell  a  story  of  fears,  sup- 
pressions, monstrous  imaginations,  symbolic  re- 
placements. I  don't  remember  much  of  that  sort 
of  thing  in  my  own  case.  It  may  have  faded  out 
of  my  mind.  There  were  probably  some  uneasy 
curiosities,  a  grotesque  dream  or  so  perhaps;  I 
can't  recall  anything  of  that  sort  distinctly  now. 
I  had  a  very  lively  interest  in  women,  even  when 
I  was  still  quite  a  little  boy,  and  a  certain — what 
shall  I  call  it? — imaginative  slavishness — not 
towards  actual  women  but  towards  something 
magnificently  feminine.    My  first  love " 

Sir  Richmond  smiled  at  some  secret  memory. 
' '  My  first  love  was  Britannia  as  depicted  by  Ten- 
niel  in  the  cartoons  in  Punch.  I  must  have  been 
a  very  little  chap  at  the  time  of  the  Britannia  af- 
fair. I  just  clung  to  her  in  my  imagination  and  did 
devoted  things  for  her.  Then  I  recall,  a  little  later, 
a  secret  abject  adoration  for  the  white  goddesses 
of  the  Crystal  Palace.    Not  for  any  particular  one 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  49 

of  them  that  I  can  remember, — for  all  of  them. 
But  I  don't  remember  anything  very  monstrous 
or  incestuous  in  my  childish  imaginations, — such 
things  as  Freud,  I  understand,  lays  stress  upon. 
If  there  was  an  (Edipus  complex  or  anything  of 
that  sort  in  my  case  it  has  been  very  completely 
washed  out  again.  Perhaps  a  child  which  is 
brought  up  in  a  proper  nursery  of  its  own  and  sees 
a  lot  of  pictures  of  the  nude  human  body,  and  so 
on,  gets  its  mind  shifted  off  any  possible  concen- 
tration upon — the  domestic  aspect  of  sex.  I  got 
to  definite  knowledge  pretty  early.  By  the  time  I 
was  eleven  or  twelve. " 

"Normally?" 

"What  is  normally?  Decently,  anyhow.  Here 
again  I  may  be  forgetting  much  secret  and  shame- 
ful curiosity.  I  got  my  ideas  into  definite  form 
out  of  a  little  straightforward  physiological  teach- 
ing and  some  dissecting  of  rats  and  mice.  My 
schoolmaster  was  a  capable  sane  man  in  advance 
of  his  times  and  my  people  believed  in  him.  I 
think  much  of  11) is  distorted  perverse  stuff  that 
grows  up  in  people's  minds  about  sex  and  de- 
velops into  evil  vices  and  still  more  evil  habits, 
is  due  to  the  mystery  we  make  about  these  things." 

"Not  entirely,"  said  the  doctor. 

"Largely.  What  child  under  a  modern  up- 
bringing over  goes  through  the  stuffy  honors  <!<■- 
scribed  in  James  Joyce's  Portrait  of  the  Artist  as 
a  Young  Man. 


50  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"I've  not  read  it." 

"A  picture  of  the  Catholic  atmosphere ;  a  young 
soul  shut  up  in  darkness  and  ignorance  to  accumu- 
late filth.  In  the  name  of  purity  and  decency  and 
under  threats  of  hell  fire." 

"Horrible!" 

"Quite.  A  study  of  intolerable  tensions,  the 
tensions  that  make  young  people  write  unclean 
words  in  secret  places." 

"Yes,  we  certainly  ventilate  and  sanitate  in 
those  matters  nowadays.  Where  nothing  is  con- 
cealed, nothing  can  explode." 

1 '  On  the  whole  I  came  up  to  adolescence  pretty 
straight  and  clean,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "What 
stands  out  in  my  memory  now  is  this  idea  of  a 
sort  of  woman  goddess  who  was  very  lovely  and 
kind  and  powerful  and  wonderful.  That  ruled  my 
secret  imaginations  as  a  boy,  but  it  was  very  much 
in  my  mind  as  I  grew  up." 

"The  mother  complex,"  said  Dr.  Martineau  as 
a  passing  botanist  might  recognize  and  name  a 
flower. 

Sir  Richmond  stared  at  him  for  a  moment. 

"It  had  not  the  slightest  connexion  with  my 
mother  or  any  mother  or  any  particular  woman 
at  all.    Far  better  to  call  it  the  goddess  complex." 

"The  connexion  is  not  perhaps  immediately 
visible,"  said  the  doctor. 

"There  was  no  connexion,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
"The   women    of   my    adolescent    dreams    were 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  51 

stripped  and  strong  and  lovely.  They  were  great 
creatures.  They  came,  it  was  clearly  traceable, 
from  pictures,  sculpture — and  from  a  definite  re- 
sponse in  myself  to  their  beauty.  My  mother  had 
nothing  whatever  to  do  with  that.  The  women 
and  girls  about  me  were  fussy  bunches  of  clothes 
that  I  am  sure  I  never  even  linked  with  that  dream 
world  of  love  and  worship. ' ' 

"Were  you  co-educated?" 

"No.  But  I  had  a  couple  of  sisters,  one  older, 
one  younger  than  myself,  and  there  were  plenty 
of  girls  in  my  circle.  I  thought  some  of  them 
pretty — but  that  was  a  different  affair.  I  know 
that  I  didn't  connect  them  with  the  idea  of  the 
loved  and  worshipped  goddesses  at  all,  because  I 
remember  when  I  first  saw  the  goddess  in  a  real 
human  being  and  how  amazed  I  was  at  the  dis- 
covery. ...  I  was  a  boy  of  twelve  or  thirteen. 
My  people  took  me  one  summer  to  Dymchurch  in 
Romney  Marsh;  in  those  days  before  the  auto- 
mobile had  made  the  Marsh  accessible  to  the  Hythe 
and  Folkestone  crowds,  it  was  a  little  old  forgotten 
silent  wind-bitten  village  crouching  under  the  lee 
of  the  great  sea  wall.  At  low  water  there  were 
miles  of  sand  as  smooth  and  shining  as  the  skin 
of  a  savage  brown  woman.  Shining  and  with  a. 
fure — the  very  same.  And  one  day  as  I  was 
mucking  about  by  myself  on  the  beach,  boy  fash- 
ion,— there  were  some  ribs  of  a  wrecked  boal 
buried  in  the  sand  near  a  t^roin  and   I   was  busy 


52  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

with  them — a  girl  ran  out  from  a  tent  high  up  on 
the  beach  and  across  the  sands  to  the  water.  She 
was  dressed  in  a  tight  bathing  dress  and  not  in 
the  clumsy  skirts  and  frills  that  it  was  the  custom 
to  inflict  on  women  in  those  days.  Her  hair  was 
tied  up  in  a  blue  handkerchief.  She  ran  swiftly 
and  gracefully,  intent  upon  the  white  line  of  foam 
ahead.  I  can  still  remember  how  the  sunlight 
touched  her  round  neck  and  cheek  as  she  went  past 
me.  She  was  the  loveliest,  most  shapely  thing  I 
have  ever  seen — to  this  day.  She  lifted  up  her 
arms  and  thrust  through  the  dazzling  white  and 
green  breakers  and  plunged  into  the  water  and 
swam ;  she  swam  straight  out  for  a  long  way  as  it 
seemed  to  me,  and  presently  came  in  and  passed 
me  again  on  her  way  back  to  her  tent,  light  and 
swift  and  sure.  The  very  prints  of  her  feet  on 
the  sand  were  beautiful.  Suddenly  I  realized  that 
there  could  be  living  people  in  the  world  as  lovely 
as  any  goddess.  .  .  .  She  wasn't  in  the  least  out 
of  breath. 

1 '  That  was  my  first  human  love.  And  I  love  that 
girl  still.  I  doubt  sometimes  whether  I  have  ever 
loved  anyone  else.  I  kept  the  thing  very  secret.  I 
wonder  now  why  I  have  kept  the  thing  so  secret. 
Until  now  I  have  never  told  a  soul  about  it.  I  re- 
sorted to  all  sorts  of  tortuous  devices  and  excuses 
to  get  a  chance  of  seeing  her  again  without  betray- 
ing what  it  was  I  was  after." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  53 

Dr.  Martineau  retained  a  simple  fondness  for 
a  story. 

"And  did  you  meet  her  again?" 

"Never.  Of  course  I  may  have  seen  her  as  a 
dressed-up  person  and  not  recognized  her.  A  day 
or  so  later  I  was  stabbed  to  the  heart  by  the  dis- 
covery that  the  tent  she  came  out  of  had  been 
taken  away." 

'  'She  had  gone?" 

"For  ever." 

Sir  Richmond  smiled  brightly  at  the  doctor's 
disappointment. 

"I  was  never  wholehearted  and  simple  about 
sexual  things,"  Sir  Richmond  resumed  presently. 
"Never.  I  do  not  think  any  man  is.  We  are  too 
much  plastered-up  things,  too  much  the  creatures 
of  a  tortuous  and  complicated  evolution." 

Dr.  Martineau,  under  his  green  umbrella, 
nodded  his  conceded  agreement. 

"This— what  shall  I  call  it?— this  Dream  of 
Women,  grew  up  in  my  mind  as  I  grew  up — as 
something  independent  of  and  much  more  impor- 
tant than  the  reality  of  Women.  It  came  only 
very  slowly  into  relation  with  that.  That  girl  on 
the  Dymchurch  beach  was  one  of  the  first  links, 
but  she  ceased  very  speedily  to  be  real — she  joined 


54    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  women  of  dreamland  at  last  altogether.  She 
became  a  sort  of  legendary  incarnation.  I  thought 
of  these  dream  women  not  only  as  something 
beautiful  but  as  something  exceedingly  kind  and 
helpful.  The  girls  and  women  I  met  belonged  to 
a  different  creation.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  stopped  abruptly  and  rowed  a 
few  long  strokes. 

Dr.  Martineau  sought  information. 

"I  suppose,"  he  said,  "there  was  a  sensuous 
element  in  these  dreamings  ? ' ' 

"Certainly.  A  very  strong  one.  It  didn't 
dominate  but  it  was  a  very  powerful  undertow." 

"Was  there  any  tendency  in  all  this  imagina- 
tive stuff  to  concentrate?  To  group  itself  about  a 
single  figure,  the  sort  of  thing  that  Victorians 
would  have  called  an  ideal?" 

' '  Not  a  bit  of  it, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond  with  con- 
viction. "There  was  always  a  tremendous  lot  of 
variety  in  my  mind.  In  fact  the  thing  I  liked  least 
in  the  real  world  was  the  way  it  was  obsessed  by 
the  idea  of  pairing  off  with  one  particular  set 
and  final  person.  I  liked  to  dream  of  a  blonde  god- 
dess in  her  own  Venusberg  one  day,  and  the  next 
I  would  be  off  over  the  mountains  with  an  armed 
Brunhild." 

"You  had  little  thought  of  children?" 

"As  a  young  man?" 

"Yes." 

1 '  None  at  all.    I  cannot  recall  a  single  philopro- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  55 

genitive  moment.  These  dream  women  were  all 
conceived  of,  and  I  was  conceived  of,  as  being  con- 
cerned in  some  tremendous  enterprise — something 
quite  beyond  domesticity.  It  kept  us  related — 
gave  us  dignity.  .  .  .  Certainly  it  wasn't  babies." 
"All  this  is  very  interesting,  very  interesting, 
from  the  scientific  point  of  view.  A  priori  it  is 
not  what  one  might  have  expected.  Reasoning 
from  the  idea  that  all  instincts  and  natural  imag- 
inations are  adapted  to  a  biological  end  and  see- 
ing that  sex  is  essentially  a  method  of  procreation, 
one  might  reasonably  expect  a  convergence,  if  not 
a  complete  concentration,  upon  the  idea  of  off- 
spring. It  is  almost  as  if  there  were  other  ends 
to  be  served.  It  is  clear  that  Nature  has  not 
worked  this  impulse  out  to  any  sight  of  its  end. 
Has  not  perhaps  troubled  to  do  so.  The  instinct 
of  the  male  for  the  female  isn't  primarily  for  off- 
spring— not  even  in  the  most  intelligent  and  far- 
seeing  types.  The  desire  just  points  to  glowing 
satisfactions  and  illusions.  Quite  equally  I  think 
the  desire  of  the  female  for  the  male  ignores  Its 
end.  Nature  has  set  about  this  business  in  a  cheap 
sort  of  way.  Sin;  is  like  some  pushful  advertising- 
tradesman.  She  isn't  frank  with  118;  she  just  hum- 
bugs us  into  what  she  wants  with  us.  All  very 
well  In  the  early  Stone  Age — when  the  poor  dear 
things  never  realized  thai  their  mutual  endear- 
ments meant  all  the  troubles  and  responsibilities 
of  parentage.    But  now /" 


56  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  shook  his  head  sideways  and  twirled  the 
green  umbrella  like  an  animated  halo  around  his 
large  broad-minded  face. 

Sir  Richmond  considered.  "Desire  has  never 
been  the  chief  incentive  of  my  relations  with 
women.  Never.  So  far  as  I  can  analyze  the  thing, 
it  has  been  a  craving  for  a  particular  sort  of  life- 
giving  companionship." 

"That  I  take  it  is  Nature's  device  to  keep  the 
lovers  together  in  the  interest  of  the  more  or  less 
unpremeditated  offspring." 

"A  poor  device,  if  that  is  its  end.  It  doesn't 
keep  parents  together;  more  often  it  tears  them 
apart.  The  wife  or  the  mistress,  so  soon  as  she  is 
encumbered  with  children,  becomes  all  too  mani- 
festly not  the  companion  goddess.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  brooded  over  his  sculls  and 
thought. 

"Throughout  my  life  I  have  been  an  exceed- 
ingly busy  man.  I  have  done  a  lot  of  scientific 
work  and  some  of  it  has  been  very  good  work.  And 
very  laborious  work.  I've  travelled  much.  I've 
organized  great  business  developments.  You 
might  think  that  my  time  has  been  fairly  well 
filled  without  much  philandering.  And  all  the 
time,  all  the  time,  I've  been — about  women — like 
a  thirsty  beast  looking  for  water.  .  .  .  Always. 
Always.    All  through  my  life." 

Dr.  Martineau  waited  through  another  silence. 

"I  was  very  grave  about  it  at  first.    I  married 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  57 

young.  I  married  very  simply  and  purely.  I  was 
not  one  of  those  young  men  who  sow  a  large  crop 
of  wild  oats.  I  was  a  fairly  decent  youth.  It  sud- 
denly appeared  to  me  that  a  certain  smiling  and 
dainty  girl  could  make  herself  into  all  the  god- 
desses of  my  dreams.  I  had  but  to  win  her  and 
this  miracle  would  occur.  Of  course  I  forget  now 
the  exact  things  I  thought  and  felt  then,  but  surely 
I  had  some  such  persuasion.  Or  why  should  I 
have  married  her?  My  wife  was  seven  years 
younger  than  myself,  a  girl  of  twenty.  She  was 
charming.  She  is  charming.  She  is  a  wonderfully 
intelligent  and  understanding  woman.  She  has 
made  a  home  for  me — a  delightful  home.  I  am  one 
of  those  men  who  have  no  instinct  for  home  mak- 
ing. I  owe  my  home  and  all  the  comfort  and  dig- 
nity of  my  life  to  her  ability.  I  have  no  excuse  for 
any  misbehaviour — so  far  as  she  is  concerned. 
None  at  all.  By  all  the  rules  I  should  have  been 
completely  happy.  But  instead  of  my  marriage 
satisfying  me,  it  presently  released  a  storm  of 
long-controlled  desires  and  imprisoned  cravings. 
A  voice  within  me  became  more  and  more  urgent. 
'This  will  not  do.  This  is  not  love.  Where  are 
your  goddesses?  This  is  not  love.'  .  .  .  And  I 
was  unfaithful  to  my  wife  within  four  years  of  my 
marriage.  It  was  a  sudden  overpowering  impulse. 
But  I  suppose  the  ground  had  been  preparing  for 
a  long  time.  I  forget  now  nil  the  emotions  of  that 
adventure.    I  suppose  at  the  time  it  seemed  beau- 


58    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

tiful  and  wonderful.  ...  I  do  not  excuse  myself. 
Still  less  do  I  condemn  myself.  I  put  the  facta 
before  you.    So  it  was. ' ' 

"There  were  no  children  by  your  marriage?" 
"Your  line  of  thought,  doctor,  is  too  philopro- 
genitive.   We  have  had  three.    My  daughter  was 
married  two  years  ago.    She  is  in  America.    One 
little  boy  died  when  he  was  three.    The  other  is  in 
India,  taking  up  the  Mardipore  power  scheme 
again  now  that  he  is  out  of  the  army.  .  .  .  No,  it 
is  simply  that  I  was  hopelessly  disappointed  with 
everything  that  a  good  woman  and  a  decent  mar- 
riage had  to  give  me.    Pure  disappointment  and 
vexation.    The  anti-climax  to  an  immense  expec- 
tation built  up  throughout  an  imaginative  boy- 
hood and  youth  and  early  manhood.    I  was  shocked 
and    ashamed    at   my    own    disappointment.      I 
thought  it  mean  and  base.    Nevertheless  this  or- 
derly household  into  which  I  had  placed  my  life, 
these  almost  methodical  connubialities  ..." 
He  broke  off  in  mid-sentence. 
Dr.  Martineau  shook  his  head  disapprovingly. 
"No,"  he  said,  "it  wasn't  fair  to  your  wife." 
"It  was  shockingly  unfair.    I  have  always  real- 
ized that.    I've  done  what  I  could  to  make  things 
up  to  her.  .   .   .  Heaven  knows  what  counter  dis- 
appointments she  has  concealed.  .  .  .  But  it  is  no 
good  arguing  about  rights  and  wrongs  now.    This 
is  not  an  apology  for  my  life.    I  am  telling  you 
what  happened." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  59 

"Not  for  me  to  judge,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 
"Go  on." 

"By  marrying  I  had  got  nothing  that  my  soul 
craved  for,  I  had  satisfied  none  but  the  most  trans- 
itory desires  and  I  had  incurred  a  tremendous 
obligation.  That  obligation  didn't  restrain  me 
from  making  desperate  lunges  at  something 
vaguely  beautiful  that  I  felt  was  necessary  to  me ; 
but  it  did  cramp  and  limit  these  lunges.  So  my 
story  flops  down  into  the  comedy  of  the  lying, 
cramped  intrigues  of  a  respectable,  married  man. 
I  was  still  driven  by  my  dream  of  some  extrava- 
gantly beautiful  inspiration  called  love  and  I 
sought  it  like  an  area  sneak.  Gods !  What  a  story 
it  is  when  one  brings  it  all  together!  I  couldn't 
believe  that  the  glow  and  sweetness  I  dreamt  of 
were  not  in  the  world — somewhere.  Hidden  away 
from  me.  I  seemed  to  catch  glimpses  of  the  dear 
lost  thing,  now  in  the  corners  of  a  smiling  mouth, 
now  in  dark  eyes  beneath  a  black  smoke  of  hair, 
now  in  a  slim  form  seen  against  the  sky.  Often  I 
cared  nothing  for  the  woman  I  made  love  to.  I 
cared  for  the  thing  she  seemed  to  be  hiding  from 
me.  .  .  ." 

Sir  Richmond's  voice  altered. 

"I  don't  see  what  possible  good  it  can  do  to 
talk  over  these  things."  He  began  to  row  and 
rowed  perhaps  a  score  of  strokes.  Then  he  stopped 
and  the  boat  drove  on  with  a  whisper  of  water  at 
the  bow  and   over  the  outstretched  oar  blades. 


60  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"What  a  muddle  and  mockery  the  whole  thing 
is!'  he  cried.  "What  a  fumbling  old  fool  old 
Mother  Nature  has  been !  She  drives  us  into  indig- 
nity and  dishonour:  and  she  doesn't  even  get  the 
children  which  are  her  only  excuse  for  her  mis- 
chief. See  what  a  fantastic  thing  I  am  when  you 
take  the  machine  to  pieces !  I  have  been  a  busy  and 
responsible  man  throughout  my  life.  I  have  han- 
dled complicated  public  and  industrial  affairs  not 
unsuccessfully  and  discharged  quite  big  obliga- 
tions fully  and  faithfully.  And  all  the  time,  hidden 
away  from  the  public  eye,  my  life  has  been  laced 
by  the  thread  of  these — what  can  one  call  them? 
— love  adventures.  How  many?  you  ask.  I  don't 
know.  Never  have  I  been  a  whole-hearted  lover ; 
never  have  I  been  able  to  leave  love  alone.  .  .  . 
Never  has  love  left  me  alone. 

"And  as  I  am  made,"  said  Sir  Richmond  with 
sudden  insistence,  "as  I  am  made — I  do  not  be- 
lieve that  I  could  go  on  without  these  affairs.  I 
know  that  you  will  be  disposed  to  dispute  that." 

Dr.  Martineau  made  a  reassuring  noise. 

"These  affairs  are  at  once  unsatisfying  and 
vitally  necessary.  It  is  only  latterly  that  I  have 
begun  to  perceive  this.  Women  make  life  for  me. 
Whatever  they  touch  or  see  or  desire  becomes 
worth  while  and  otherwise  it  is  not  worth  while. 
Whatever  is  lovely  in  my  world,  whatever  is  de- 
lightful, has  been  so  conveyed  to  me  by  some 
woman.    Without  the  vision  they  give  me,  I  should 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  61 

be  a  hard  dry  industry  in  the  world,  a  worker  ant, 
a  soulless  rage,  making  much,  valuing  nothing." 

He  paused. 

"You  are,  I  think,  abnormal,"  considered  the 
doctor. 

"Not  abnormal.  Excessive,  if  you  like.  With- 
out women  I  am  a  wasting  fever  of  distressful  toil. 
Without  them  there  is  no  kindness  in  existence,  no 
rest,  no  sort  of  satisfaction.  The  world  is  a  battle- 
field, trenches,  barbed  wire,  rain,  mud,  logical 
necessity  and  utter  desolation — with  nothing 
whatever  worth  fighting  for.  "Whatever  justifies 
effort,   whatever   restores   energy   is   hidden  in 


women.  .  .  ." 


1  *  An  access  of  sex, ' '  said  Dr.  Martineau.  ' '  This 
is  a  phase.  ..." 

"It  is  how  I  am  made,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

A  brief  silence  fell  upon  that.  Dr.  Martineau 
persisted.  "It  isn't  how  you  are  made.  We  are 
getting  to  something  in  all  this.  It  is,  I  insist,  a 
mood  of  how  you  are  made.  A  distinctive  and 
indicative  mood." 

Sir  Richmond  went  on,  almost  as  if  he  solilo- 
quized. 

"I  would  go  through  it  ;ill  again.  .  .  .  There 
are  times  when  the  love  of  women  seems  the  only 
real  thing  in  the  world  to  me.  And  always  it  re- 
mains the  most  real  thing.  T  do  not  know  how 
far  I  may  be  a  normal  man  or  how  far  I  may  not 
be,  so  to  speak,  abnormally  male,  but  to  mo  life 


62  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

has  very  little  personal  significance  and  no  value 
or  power  until  it  has  a  woman  as  intermediary. 
Before  life  can  talk  to  me  and  say  anything  that 
matters  a  woman  must  be  present  as  a  medium. 
I  don't  mean  that  it  has  no  significance  mentally 
and  logically;  I  mean  that  irrationally  and  emo- 
tionally it  has  no  significance.  Works  of  art,  for 
example,  bore  me,  literature  bores  me,  scenery 
bores  me,  even  the  beauty  of  a  woman  bores  me, 
unless  I  find  in  it  some  association  with  a  woman's 
feeling.  It  isn't  that  I  can't  tell  for  myself  that 
a  picture  is  fine  or  a  mountain  valley  lovely,  but 
that  it  doesn't  matter  a  rap  to  me  whether  it  is  or 
whether  it  isn't  until  there  is  a  feminine  response, 
a  sexual  motif,  if  you  like  to  call  it  that,  coming  in. 
Whatever  there  is  of  loveliness  or  pride  in  life 
doesn't  live  for  me  until  somehow  a  woman  comes 
in  and  breathes  upon  it  the  breath  of  life.  I  can- 
not even  rest  until  a  woman  makes  holiday  for  me. 
Only  one  thing  can  T  do  without  women  and  that  is 
work,  joylessly  but  effectively,  and  latterly  for 
some  reason  that  it  is  up  to  you  to  discover,  doc- 
tor, even  the  power  of  work  has  gone  from  me. 


"This  afternoon  brings  back  to  me  very  vividly 
my  previous  visit  here.  It  was  perhaps  a  dozen  or 
fifteen  years  ago.     We   rowed  down  this  same 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  63 

backwater.  I  can  see  my  companion's  hand — she 
had  very  pretty  hands  with  rosy  palms — trailing 
in  the  water,  and  her  shadowed  face  smiling 
quietly  under  her  sunshade,  with  little  faint 
streaks  of  sunlight,  reflected  from  the  ripples, 
dancing  and  quivering  across  it.  She  was  one  of 
those  people  who  seem  always  to  be  happy  and  to 
radiate  happiness. 

"By  ordinary  standards,"  said  Sir  Richmond, 
"she  was  a  thoroughly  bad  lot.  She  had  about 
as  much  morality,  in  the  narrower  sense  of  the 
word,  as  a  monkey.  And  yet  she  stands  out  in  my 
mind  as  one  of  the  most  honest  women  I  have  ever 
met.  She  was  certainly  one  of  the  kindest.  Part  of 
that  effect  of  honesty  may  have  been  due  to  her 
open  brow,  her  candid  blue  eyes,  the  smiling 
frankness  of  her  manner.  .  .  .  But — no!  She 
was  really  honest. 

"We  drifted  here  as  we  are  doing  now.  She 
pulled  at  the  sweet  rushes  and  crushed  them  in 
her  hand.  She  adds  a  remembered  brightness  to 
this  afternoon. 

"Honest.  Friendly.  Of  all  the  women  I  have 
known,  this  woman  who  was  here  with  me  came 
nearest  to  being  my  friend.  You  know,  what  we 
call  virtue  in  a  woman  is  a  tremendous  handicap 
to  any  real  friendliness  with  a  man.  Until  she  gets 
to  an  age  when  virtue  and  fidelity  are  no  longer 
urgent  practical  concerns,  a  good  woman,  by  the 
very  definition  of  feminine  goodness,  isn't  truly 


64  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

herself.  Over  a  vast  extent  of  her  being  she  is 
reserved.  She  suppresses  a  vast  amount  of  her 
being,  holds  back,  denies,  hides.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  is  a  frankness  and  honesty  in  openly 
bad  women  arising  out  of  the  admitted  fact  that 
they  are  bad,  that  they  hide  no  treasure  from  you, 
they  have  no  peculiarly  precious  and  delicious 
secrets  to  keep,  and  no  poverty  to  conceal.  In- 
tellectually they  seem  to  be  more  manly  and  vigor- 
ous because  they  are,  as  people  say,  unsexed. 
Many  old  women,  thoroughly  respectable  old 
women,  have  the  same  quality.  Because  they  have 
gone  out  of  the  personal  sex  business.  Haven't 
you  found  that?" 

' 'I  have  never,"  said  the  doctor,  ''known  what 
you  call  an  openly  bad  woman, — at  least,  at  all 
intimately.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  looked  with  quick  curiosity  at 
his  companion.    ' '  You  have  avoided  them  % ' ' 

"They  don't  attract  me." 

"They  repel  you?" 

"For  me,"  said  the  doctor,  "for  any  friendli- 
ness, a  woman  must  be  modest.  .  .  .  My  habits  of 
thought  are  old-fashioned,  I  suppose,  but  the 
mere  suggestion  about  a  woman  that  there  were 
no  barriers,  no  reservation,  that  in  any  fashion 
she  might  more  than  meet  me  half  way  ..." 

His  facial  expression  completed  his  sentence. 

"Now  I  wonder,"  whispered  Sir  Richmond,  and 
hesitated  for  a  moment  before  he  carried  the  great 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  65 

research  into  the  explorer's  country.  ''You  are 
afraid  of  women?"  he  said,  with  a  smile  to  miti- 
gate the  impertinence. 

"I  respect  them." 

"An  element  of  fear." 

"Well,  I  am  afraid  of  them  then.  Put  it  that 
way  if  you  like.  Anyhow  I  do  not  let  myself  go 
with  them.    I  have  never  let  myself  go. ' ' 

"You  lose  something.  You  lose  a  reality  of 
insight. ' ' 

There  was  a  thoughtful  interval. 

"Having  found  so  excellent  a  friend,"  said  the 
doctor,  "why  did  you  ever  part  from  her?" 

Sir  Richmond  seemed  indisposed  to  answer,  but 
Dr.  Martineau's  face  remained  slantingly  inter- 
rogative. He  had  found  the  effective  counter- 
attack and  he  meant  to  press  it. 

"I  was  jealous  of  her,"  Sir  Richmond  admitted. 
"I  couldn't  stand  that  side  of  it." 


§5 

After  a  meditative  silence  the  doctor  became 
briskly  profession;!]  again. 

"You  care  for  your  wife,"  he  Baid.  "You  care 
very  much  for  your  wife.  She  is,  as  you  say,  your 
great  obligation  and  you  are  a  man  to  respect 
obligations.  I  grasp  that.  Then  you  tell  me  of 
these  women  who  have  come  and  gone.  .  .  .  About 


66  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

them  too  you  are  perfectly  frank.  .  .  .  There  re- 
mains someone  else." 

Sir  Richmond  stared  at  his  physician. 

''Well,"  he  said  and  laughed.  "I  didn't  pre- 
tend to  have  made  my  autobiography  anything 
more  than  a  sketch." 

"No,  but  there  is  a  special  person,  the  current 
person." 

"I  haven't  dilated  on  my  present  situation,  I 
admit." 

"From  some  little  things  that  have  dropped 
from  you,  I  should  say  there  is  a  child." 

"That,"  said  Sir  Richmond  after  a  brief  pause, 
"is  a  good  guess." 

"Not  older  than  three." 

' '  Two  years  and  a  half. ' ' 

"You  and  this  lady  who  is,  I  guess,  young,  are 
separated.  At  any  rate,  you  can't  go  to  her. 
That  leaves  you  at  loose  ends,  because  for  some 
time,  for  two  or  three  years  at  least,  you  have 
ceased  to  be — how  shall  I  put  it? — an  emotional 
wanderer." 

"I  begin  to  respect  your  psychoanalysis." 

"Hence  your  overwhelming  sense  of  the  neces- 
sity of  feminine  companionship  for  weary  men.  I 
guess  she  is  a  very  jolly  companion  to  be  with, 
amusing,  restful — interesting. ' ' 

"H'm,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "I  think  that  is  a 
fair  description.  When  she  cares,  that  is.  When 
she  is  in  good  form." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  67 

"Which  she  isn't  at  present,"  hazarded  the 
doctor. 

He  exploded  a  mine  of  long-pent  exasperation. 

"She  is  the  clumsiest  hand  at  keeping  well  that 
I  have  ever  known.  Health  is  a  woman's  primary 
duty.  But  she  is  incapable  of  the  most  elementary 
precautions.  She  is  maddeningly  receptive  to 
every  infection.  At  the  present  moment,  when  I 
am  ill,  when  I  am  in  urgent  need  of  help  and 
happiness,  she  has  let  that  wretched  child  get 
measles  and  she  herself  won't  let  me  go  near  her 
because  she  has  got  something  disfiguring,  some- 
thing nobody  else  could  ever  have  or  think  of  hav- 
ing, called  carbuncle.    Carbuncle ! ' ' 

"It  is  very  painful,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 

"No  doubt  it  is,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "No 
doubt  it  is."  His  voice  grew  bitter.  He  spoke 
with  deliberation.  "A  perfectly  aimless,  useless 
illness, — and  as  painful  as  it  can  be." 

He  spoke  as  if  he  slammed  a  door  viciously. 
And  indeed  he  had  slammed  a  door.  The  doctor 
realized  that  for  the  presenl  there  was  no  more 
self-dissection  to  be  go1  from  Sir  Richmond. 

For  some  time  Sir  Richmond  had  been  keeping 
Hi*'  boal  close  up  to  the  foaming  weir  to  the  left 
of  the  lock  by  an  occasional  stroke.  Now  with  a 
general  air  of*  departure  he  Bwnng  the  boal  round 
and  began  to  row  down  stream  towards  the  bridge 
and  the  Efcadianl  Hotel. 

"Time  we  bad  tea,"  he  said. 


68  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 


$6 

After  tea  Dr.  Martineau  left  Sir  Richmond  in  a 
chair  upon  the  lawn,  brooding  darkly — apparently 
over  the  crime  of  the  carbuncle.  The  doctor  went 
to  his  room,  ostensibly  to  write  a  couple  of  letters 
and  put  on  a  dinner  jacket,  but  really  to  make  a 
few  notes  of  the  afternoon's  conversation  and 
meditate  over  his  impressions  while  they  were 
fresh. 

His  room  proffered  a  comfortable  armchair 
and  into  this  he  sank.  ...  A  number  of  very  dis- 
crepant things  were  busy  in  his  mind.  He  had  ex- 
perienced a  disconcerting  personal  attack.  There 
was  a  whirl  of  active  resentment  in  the  confusion. 

1 'Apologetics  of  a  rake,"  he  tried  presently. 

"A  common  type,  stripped  of  his  intellectual 
dressing.  Every  third  manufacturer  from  the 
midlands  or  the  north  has  some  such  undertow  of 
'affairs.'  A  physiological  uneasiness,  an  imagin- 
ative laxity,  the  temptations  of  the  trip  to  Lon- 
don— weakness  masquerading  as  a  psychological 
necessity.  The  Lady  of  the  Carbuncle  seems  to 
have  got  rather  a  hold  upon  him.  She  has  kept 
him  in  order  for  three  or  four  years." 

The  doctor  scrutinized  his  own  remarks  with  a 
judicious  expression. 

"I  am  not  being  fair.  He  ruffled  me.  Even 
if  it  is  true,  as  I  said,  that  every  third  manufac- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  69 

turer  from  the  midlands  is  in  much  the  same  case 
as  he  is,  that  does  not  dismiss  the  case.  It  makes 
it  a  more  important  one,  much  more  important :  it 
makes  it  a  type  case  with  the  exceptional  quality 
of  being  self-expressive.  .  .  .  Almost  too  self- 
expressive. 

"Sir  Richmond  does,  after  all,  make  out  a  sort 
of  case  for  himself.  .  .  . 

"A  valid  case?" 

The  doctor  sat  deep  in  his  chair,  frowning  judi- 
cially with  the  fingers  of  one  hand  apposed  to  the 
fingers  of  the  other.  "He  makes  me  bristle  be- 
cause all  his  life  and  ideas  challenge  my  way 
of  living.  .  .  .  But  if  I  eliminate  the  personal 
element?" 

He  pulled  a  sheet  of  note-paper  towards  him 
and  began  to  jot  down  notes  with  a  silver-cased 
pencil.  Soon  he  discontinued  writing  and  sat  tap- 
ping his  pencil-case  on  the  table. 

"The  amazing  .selfishness  of  his  attitude!  I  do 
not  think  that  once — not  once — has  he  judged  any 
woman  except  as  a  contributor  to  his  energy  and 
peace  of  mind.  .  .  .  Except  in  the  case  of  his 
wife.  .  .  . 

"For  her  his  habit  of  respect  was  formed  be- 
fore his  ideas  developed.  .  .  . 

"That  I  think  explains  her.  .  .  . 

""What  was  his  phrase  about  the  unfortunate 
young  woman  with  the  carbuncle?  .  .  .  'Totally 
useless  and  annec        ry  illness,'  was  it?  .  .  . 


70  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

1 *  Now  lias  a  man  any  right  by  any  standards  to 
use  women  as  this  man  has  used  them1? 

"By  any  standards?" 

The  doctor  frowned  and  nodded  his  head  slowly 
with  the  corners  of  his  mouth  drawn  in. 

For  some  years  now  an  intellectual  reverie  had 
been  playing  an  increasing  part  in  the  good  doc- 
tor's life.  He  was  writing  this  book  of  his,  writ- 
ing it  very  deliberately  and  laboriously,  The  Psy- 
chology of  a  New  Age,  but  much  more  was  he 
dreaming  and  thinking  about  this  book.  Its  pub- 
lication was  to  mark  an  epoch  in  human  thought 
and  human  affairs  generally,  and  create  a  consid- 
erable flutter  of  astonishment  in  the  doctor's  own 
little  world.  It  was  to  bring  home  to  people  some 
various  aspects  of  one  very  startling  proposition : 
that  human  society  had  arrived  at  a  phase  when 
the  complete  restatement  of  its  fundamental  ideas 
had  become  urgently  necessary,  a  phase  when  the 
slow,  inadequate,  partial  adjustments  to  two  cen- 
turies of  changing  conditions  had  to  give  place  to 
a  rapid  reconstruction  of  new  fundamental  ideas. 
And  it  was  a  fact  of  great  value  in  the  drama  of 
these  secret  dreams  that  the  directive  force 
towards  this  fundamentally  reconstructed  world 
should  be  the  pen  of  an  unassuming  Harley  Street 
physician,  hitherto  not  suspected  of  any  great 
excesses  of  enterprise. 

The  written  portions  of  this  book  were  already 
in  a  highly  polished  state.    They  combined  a  limit- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  71 

less  freedom  of  proposal  with  a  smooth  urbanity 
of  manner,  a  tacit  denial  that  the  thoughts  of  one 
intelligent  being  could  possibly  be  shocking  to 
another.  Upon  this  the  doctor  was  very  insistent. 
Conduct,  he  held,  could  never  be  sufficiently  dis- 
creet, thought  could  never  be  sufficiently  free.  As 
a  citizen  one  had  to  treat  a  law  or  an  institution 
as  a  thing  as  rigidly  right  as  a  natural  law.  That 
the  social  well-being  demands.  But  as  a  scientific 
man,  in  one's  stated  thoughts  and  in  public  dis- 
cussion, the  case  was  altogether  different.  There 
was  no  offence  in  any  possible  hypothesis  or  in  the 
contemplation  of  any  possibility.  Just  as  when 
one  played  a  game  one  was  bound  to  play  in  un- 
questioning obedience  to  the  laws  and  spirit  of  the 
game,  but  if  one  was  not  playing  that  game  then 
there  was  no  reason  why  one  should  not  contem- 
plate the  completest  reversal  of  all  its  methods 
and  the  alteration  and  abandonment  of  every  rule. 
Correctness  of  conduct,  the  doctor  held,  was  an 
imperative  concomitant  of  all  really  free  thinking. 
Revolutionary  speculation  is  one  of  those  things 
that  must  be  divorced  absolutely  from  revolution- 
ary conduct.  It  was  to  the  neglect  of  these  ob- 
vious principles,  as  the  doctor  considered  them, 
tli.it  the  general  muddle  in  contemporary  marital 
affairs  was  very  largely  due.  We  lefl  divorce-law 
revision  to  exposed  adulterers  and  marriage  re- 
form to  hot  adolescents  and  craving  spinsters 
driven  by  the  furies  within  them  to  assertions  that 


72    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

established  nothing  and  to  practical  demonstra- 
tions that  only  left  everybody  thoroughly  uncom- 
fortable. Far  better  to  leave  all  these  matters  to 
calm,  patient  men  in  easy  chairs,  weighing  typical 
cases  impartially,  ready  to  condone,  indisposed  to 
envy. 

In  return  for  which  restraint  on  the  part  of  the 
eager  and  adventurous,  the  calm  patient  man  was 
prepared  in  his  thoughts  to  fly  high  and  go  far. 
Without  giving  any  guarantee,  of  course,  that  he 
might  not  ultimately  return  to  the  comfortable 
point  of  inaction  from  which  he  started. 

In  Sir  Richmond,  Dr.  Martineau  found  the  most 
interesting  and  encouraging  confirmation  of  the 
fundamental  idea  of  The  Psychology  of  a  Neiv 
Age,  the  immediate  need  of  new  criteria  of  con- 
duct altogether.  Here  was  a  man  whose  life  was 
evidently  ruled  by  standards  that  were  at  once 
very  high  and  very  generous.  He  was  overwork- 
ing himself  to  the  pitch  of  extreme  distress  and 
apparently  he  was  doing  this  for  ends  that  were 
essentially  unselfish.  Manifestly  there  were  many 
things  that  an  ordinary  industrial  or  political 
magnate  would  do  that  Sir  Richmond  would  not 
dream  of  doing,  and  a  number  of  things  that  such 
a  man  would  not  feel  called  upon  to  do  that  he 
would  regard  as  imperative  duties.  And  mixed  up 
with  so  much  fine  intention  and  fine  conduct  was 
this  disreputable  streak  of  intrigue  and  this  ex- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  73 

traordinary  claim  that  such  misconduct  was 
necessary  to  continued  vigour  of  action. 

"To  energy  of  thought  it  is  not  necessary,' '  said 
Dr.  Martineau,  and  considered  for  a  time. 

"Yet — certainly — I  am  not  a  man  of  action.  I 
admit  it.    I  make  few  decisions." 

The  chapters  of  the  Psychology  of  a  New  Age 
dealing  with  women  were  still  undrafted,  but  they 
had  already  greatly  exercised  the  doctor's  mind. 
He  found  now  that  the  case  of  Sir  Richmond  had 
stirred  his  imagination.  He  sat  with  his  hands 
apposed,  his  head  on  one  side,  and  an  expression 
of  great  intellectual  contentment  on  his  face  while 
these  emancipated  ideas  gave  a  sort  of  gala  per- 
formance in  his  mind. 

The  good  doctor  did  not  dislike  women,  he  had 
always  guarded  himself  very  carefully  against 
misogyny,  but  he  was  very  strongly  disposed  to 
regard  them  as  much  less  necessary  in  the  existing 
scheme  of  things  than  was  generally  assumed. 
Women,  he  conceded,  had  laid  the  foundations  of 
social  life.  Through  their  contrivances  and  sacri- 
ii<  <■  and  patience  the  fierce  and  lonely  patriarchal 
family-herd  of  a  male  and  his  women  and  off- 
spring bad  grown  into  the  clan  and  tribe;  the 
woven    tissue   of   related    families   that   constitute 

the  human  comity  had  been  woven  by  the  subtle, 
persistenl  protection  of  sons  and  daughters  by 
their  mothers  against  the  intolerant,  jealous,  pos- 
sessive Old  Man.    But  that  was  a  thing  of  the  re- 


74  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

mote  past.  Little  was  left  of  those  ancient  strug- 
gles now  but  a  few  infantile  dreams  and  night- 
mares. The  greater  human  community,  human 
society,  was  made  for  good.  And  being  made,  it 
had  taken  over  the  ancient  tasks  of  the  woman, 
one  by  one,  until  now  in  its  modern  forms  it  cher- 
ished more  sedulously  than  she  did,  it  educated, 
it  housed  and  comforted,  it  clothed  and  served 
and  nursed,  leaving  the  wife  privileged,  honoured, 
protected,  for  the  sake  of  tasks  she  no  longer  did 
and  of  a  burthen  she  no  longer  bore.  "Progress 
has  trivialized  women,"  said  the  doctor,  and  made 
a  note  of  the  word  for  later  consideration. 

"And  woman  has  trivialized  civilization,"  the 
doctor  tried. 

"She  has  retained  her  effect  of  being  cen- 
tral, she  still  makes  the  social  atmosphere,  she 
raises  men's  instinctive  hopes  of  help  and  direc- 
tion. Except,"  the  doctor  stipulated,  "for  a  few 
highly  developed  modern  types,  most  men  found 
the  sense  of  achieving  her  a  necessary  condition 
for  sustained  exertion.  And  there  is  no  direction 
in  her  any  more. 

"She  spends,"  said  the  doctor,  "she  just 
spends.  She  spends  excitingly  and  competitively 
for  her  own  pride  and  glory,  she  drives  all  the 
energy  of  men  over  the  weirs  of  gain.  .   .   . 

' '  What  are  we  to  do  with  the  creature  ? ' '  whis- 
pered the  doctor. 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  75 

Apart  from  the  procreative  necessity,  was 
woman  an  unavoidable  evil?  The  doctor's  un- 
trammelled thoughts  began  to  climb  high,  spin, 
nose  dive  and  loop  the  loop.  Nowadays  we  took 
a  proper  care  of  the  young,  we  had  no  need  for 
high  birth  rates,  quite  a  small  proportion  of 
women  with  a  gift  in  that  direction  could  supply 
all  the  offspring  that  the  world  wanted.  Given  the 
power  of  determining  sex  that  science  was  slowly 
winning  to-day,  and  why  should  we  have  so  many 
women  about?  A  drastic  elimination  of  the  crea- 
tures would  be  quite  practicable.  A  fantastic 
world  to  a  vulgar  imagination,  no  doubt,  but  to  a 
calmly  reasonable  mind  by  no  means  fantastic. 
But  this  was  where  the  case  of  Sir  Richmond  be- 
came so  interesting.  Was  it  really  true  that  the 
companionship  of  women  was  necessary  to  these 
energetic  creative  types?  Was  it  the  fact  that  the 
drive  of  life  towards  action,  as  distinguished 
from  contemplation,  arose  out  of  sex  and  needed 
to  be  refreshed  by  the  reiteration  of  that  motive? 
It  was  a  plausible  proposition  :  it  marched  with  all 
the  doctor's  ideas  of  natural  selection  and  of 
the  conditions  of  a  survival  that  have  made  us 
what  we  are.  It  was  in  tune  with  the  Freudian 
analyses. 

"Sex  not  only  a  renewal  of  life  in  the  species," 
noted  the  doctor's  silver  pencil;  "sex  may  be  also 
a  renewal  of  chckjii  hi  Ihr  individual." 


76  SECRET  PLACES  OP  THE  HEART 

After  some  musing  he  crossed  out  "sex"  and 
wrote  above  it  "sexual  love." 

"That  is  practically  what  he  claims,"  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau  said.  "In  which  case  we  want  the  com- 
pletest  revision  of  all  our  standards  of  sexual 
obligation.  "We  want  a  new  system  of  restrictions 
and  imperatives  altogether." 

It  was  a  fixed  idea  of  the  doctor's  that  women 
were  quite  incapable  of  producing  ideas  in  the 
same  way  that  men  do,  but  he  believed  that  with 
suitable  encouragement  they  could  be  induced  to 
respond  quite  generously  to  such  ideas.  Suppose 
therefore  we  really  educated  the  imaginations  of 
women;  suppose  we  turned  their  indubitable  ca- 
pacity for  service  towards  social  and  political 
creativeness,  not  in  order  to  make  them  the  rivals 
of  men  in  these  fields,  but  their  moral  and  actual 
helpers. 

"A  man  of  this  sort  wants  a  mistress-mother," 
said  the  doctor.  ' '  He  wants  a  sort  of  woman  who 
cares  more  for  him  and  his  work  and  honour  than 
she  does  for  child  or  home  or  clothes  or  personal 
pride. 

"But  are  there  such  women? 

"Can  there  be  such  a  woman? 

"His  work  needs  to  be  very  fine  to  deserve  her 
help.    But  admitting  its  fineness?  .  .  . 

"The  alternative  seems  to  be  to  teach  the  sexes 
to  get  along  without  each  other. 

"A    neutralized    world.     A    separated    world. 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  77 

How  we  should  jostle  in  the  streets !  But  the  early- 
Christians  have  tried  it  already.  The  thing  is 
impossible. 

1  *  Very  well,  then,  we  have  to  make  women  more 
responsible  again.  In  a  new  capacity.  We  have 
to  educate  them  far  more  seriously  as  sources  of 
energy — as  guardians  and  helpers  of  men.  And 
we  have  to  suppress  them  far  more  rigorously  as 
tempters  and  dissipaters.  Instead  of  mothering 
babies  they  have  to  mother  the  race.  ..." 

A  vision  of  women  made  responsible  floated  be- 
fore his  eyes. 

' '  Is  that  man  working  better  since  you  got  hold 
of  him?    If  not,  why  not? 

"Or  again, — Jane  Smith  was  charged  with 
neglecting  her  lover  to  the  common  danger.  .  .  . 
The  inspector  said  the  man  was  in  a  pitiful  state, 
morally  quite  uncombed  and  infested  with  vulgar, 
showy  ideas.  ..." 

The  doctor  laughed,  telescoped  his  pencil  and 
stood  up. 

It  became  evident  aftor  dinner  that  Sir  Rich- 
mond also  had  been  thinking  over  the  afternoon's 
conversation. 

Be  and  Dr.  Martineau  sat  in  wide-armed  cane 
chairs  on  the  lawn  with  a  wickerwork  table 
bearing  coffee  caps  and  little  glasses  between 
them.     A    Pew  other  dim         hatted   and   whis- 


78  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

pored  about  similar  tables  but  not  too  close  to 
our  talkers  to  disturb  them;  the  dining  room  be- 
hind them  had  cleared  its  tables  and  depressed 
its  illumination.  The  moon,  in  its  first  quarter, 
hung  above  the  sunset,  sank  after  twilight,  shone 
brighter  and  brighter  among  the  western  trees, 
and  presently  had  gone,  leaving  the  sky  to  an  in- 
creasing multitude  of  stars.  The  Maidenhead 
river  wearing  its  dusky  blue  draperies  and  its 
jewels  of  light  had  recovered  all  the  magic  Sir 
Richmond  had  stripped  from  it  in  the  afternoon. 
The  grave  arches  of  the  bridge,  made  complete 
circles  by  the  reflexion  of  the  water,  sustained, 
as  if  by  some  unifying  and  justifying  reason,  the 
erratic  flat  flashes  and  streaks  and  glares  of  traffic 
that  fretted  to  and  fro  overhead.  A  voice  sang 
intermittently  and  a  banjo  tinkled,  but  remotely 
enough  to  be  indistinct  and  agreeable. 

"After  all,"  Sir  Richmond  began  abruptly, 
"the  search  for  some  sort  of  sexual  modus  vivendi 
is  only  a  means  to  an  end.  One  does  not  want  to 
live  for  sex  but  only  through  sex.  The  main  thing 
in  my  life  has  always  been  my  work.  This  after- 
noon, under  the  Maidenhead  influence,  I  talked 
too  much  of  sex.  I  babbled.  Of  things  one  doesn't 
usually —  ..." 

"It  was  very  illuminating,"  said  the  doctor. 

"No  doubt.  But  a  temporary  phase.  It  is  the 
defective  bearing  talks.  .  .  .  Just  now I  hap- 
pen to  be  irritated." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  79 

The  darkness  concealed  a  faint  smile  on  the 
doctor 's  face. 

"The  work  is  the  thing,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
1 '  So  long  as  one  can  keep  one 's  grip  on  it. ' ' 

"What,"  said  the  doctor  after  a  pause,  leaning 
back  and  sending  wreaths  of  smoke  up  towards 
the  star-dusted  zenith,  "what  is  your  idea  of  your 
work?  I  mean,  how  do  you  see  it  in  relation  to 
yourself — and  things  generally  ? ' ' 

"Put  in  the  most  general  terms?" 

"Put  in  the  most  general  terms." 

"I  wonder  if  I  can  put  it  in  general  terms  for 
you  at  all.  It  is  hard  to  put  something  one  is 
always  thinking  about  in  general  terms  or  to  think 
of  it  as  a  whole.  .  .  .  Now.  .  .  .  Fuel?  .  .  . 

"I  suppose  it  was  my  father's  business  inter- 
ests that  pushed  me  towards  specialization  in  fuel. 
He  wanted  me  to  have  a  thoroughly  scientific 
training  in  days  when  a  scientific  training  was  less 
easy  to  get  for  a  boy  than  it  is  to-day.  And  much 
more  inspiring  when  you  got  it.  My  mind  was 
framed,  so  to  speak,  in  geology  and  astronomical 
physics.  I  grew  up  to  think  on  that  scale.  Just  as 
a  man  who  has  been  trained  in  history  and  law 
grows  to  think  on  the  scale  of  the  Roman  empire. 
I  don't  know  what  your  pocket  map  of  the  uni- 
verse is, — the  map,  I  mean,  by  which  you  judge  all 
sorts  of  other  general  ideas.  To  me  this  planet 
is  a  little  ball  of  oxides  and  nickel  steel;  life  a 
sort  of  tarnish  on  its  surface.    And  we, — the  mi- 


80  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

nutest  particles  in  that  tarnish.  Who  can  never- 
theless, in  some  unaccountable  way,  take  in  the 
idea  of  this  universe  as  one  whole, — who  begin  to 
dream  of  taking  control  of  it. ' ' 

"That  is  not  a  bad  statement  of  the  scientific 
point  of  view.  I  suppose  I  have  much  the  same 
general  idea  of  the  world.  On  rather  more  psy- 
chological lines." 

"We  think,  I  suppose,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  "of 
life  as  something  that  is  only  just  beginning  to  be 
aware  of  what  it  is — and  what  it  might  be." 

"Exactly,"  said  the  doctor.    "Good." 

He  went  on  eagerly.  ' '  That  is  precisely  how  I 
see  it.  You  and  I  are  just  particles  in  the  tarnish, 
as  you  call  it,  who  are  becoming  dimly  awake  to 
what  we  are,  to  what  we  have  in  common.  Only 
a  very  few  of  us  have  got  as  far  even  as  this.  .  .  ? 
These  others  here,  for  example.  ..." 

He  indicated  the  rest  of  Maidenhead  by  a 
movement. 

"Desire,  mutual  flattery,  egotistical  dreams, 
greedy  solicitudes  fill  them  up.  They  haven't  be- 
gun to  get  out  of  themselves." 

"We,  I  suppose,  have,"  doubted  Sir  Richmond. 

"We  have." 

The  doctor  had  no  doubt.  He  lay  back  in  his 
chair,  with  his  hands  behind  his  head  and  his 
smoke  ascending  vertically  to  heaven.  With  the 
greatest  contentment  he  began  quoting  himself. 
1 '  This  getting  out  of  one 's  individuality — this  con- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  81 

scious  getting  out  of  one 's  individuality — is  one  of 
the  most  important  and  interesting  aspects  of  the 
psychology  of  the  new  age  that  is  now  dawning. 
As  compared  with  any  previous  age.  Uncon- 
sciously, of  course,  every  true  artist,  every  philos- 
opher, every  scientific  investigator,  so  far  as  his 
art  or  thought  went,  has  always  got  out  of  him- 
self,— has  forgotten  his  personal  interests  and  be- 
come Man  thinking  for  the  whole  race.  And  inti- 
mations of  the  same  thing  have  been  at  the  heart 
of  most  religions.  But  now  people  are  beginning 
to  get  this  detachment  without  any  distinctively 
religious  feeling  or  any  distinctive  aesthetic  or 
intellectual  impulse,  as  if  it  were  a  plain  matter  of 
fact.  Plain  matter  of  fact, — that  we  are  only 
incidentally  ourselves.  That  really  each  one  of 
us  is  also  the  whole  species,  is  really  indeed  all 
life." 

"A  part  of  it." 

"An  integral  part — as  sight  is  part  of  a  man 
.  .  .  with  no  absolute  separation  from  all  the  rest 
— no  more  than  a  separation  of  the  imagination. 
The  whole  so  far  as  his  distinctive  quality  goes.  1 
do  not  know  how  this  takes  shape  in  your  mind, 
Sir  Richmond,  but  to  me  this  idea  of  actually  be- 
ing life  itself  upon  the  world,  a  special  phase  of  it 
dependent  upon  and  connected  with  all  other 
phases,  and  of  being  one  of  a  small  but  growing 
number  of  people  who  apprehend  that,  and  want 
to  live  in  the  spirit  of  that,  is  quite  central.    It  is 


82  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

my  fundamental  idea.  We, — this  small  but  grow- 
ing minority — constitute  that  part  of  life  which 
knows  and  wills  and  tries  to  rule  its  destiny.  This 
new  realization,  the  new  psychology  arising  out  of 
it,  is  a  fact  of  supreme  importance  in  the  history  of 
life.  It  is  like  the  appearance  of  self -conscious- 
ness in  some  creature  that  has  not  hitherto  had 
self -consciousness.  And  so  far  as  we  are  con- 
cerned, we  are  the  true  kingship  of  the  world. 
Necessarily.  We  who  know,  are  the  true  king:. 
...  I  wonder  how  this  appeals  to  you.  It  is  stuff 
I  have  thought  out  very  slowly  and  carefully  and 
written  and  approved.  It  is  the  very  core  of  my 
life.  .  .  .  And  yet  when  one  comes  to  say  these 
things  to  someone  else,  face  to  face.  ...  It  is 
much  more  difficult  to  say  than  to  write." 

Sir  Richmond  noted  how  the  doctor's  chair 
creaked  as  he  rolled  to  and  fro  with  the  uneasiness 
of  these  intimate  utterances. 

1 '  I  agree, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond  presently.  ' '  One 
does  think  in  this  fashion.  Something  in  this  fash- 
ion. What  one  calls  one's  work  does  belong  to 
something  much  bigger  than  ourselves. 

"Something  much  bigger,"  he  expanded. 

""Which  something  we  become,"  the  doc- 
tor urged,  "in  so  far  as  our  work  takes  hold 
of  us." 

Sir  Richmond  made  no  answer  to  this  for  a  lit- 
tle while.  "Of  course  we  trail  a  certain  egotism 
into  our  work,"  he  said. 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  83 

"Could  we  do  otherwise?  But  it  has  ceased  to 
be  purely  egotism.  It  is  no  longer,  'I  am  F  but  '1 
am  part.'  .  .  .  One  wants  to  be  an  honourable 
part." 

"You  think  of  man  upon  his  planet,"  the  doctor 
pursued.  "I  think  of  life  rather  as  a  mind  that 
tries  itself  over  in  millions  and  millions  of  trials. 
But  it  works  out  to  the  same  thing." 

"I  think  in  terms  of  fuel,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

He  was  still  debating  the  doctor's  generaliza- 
tion. "I  suppose  it  would  be  true  to  say  that  I 
think  of  myself  as  mankind  on  his  planet,  with 
very  considerable  possibilities  and  with  only  a 
limited  amount  of  fuel  at  his  disposal  to  achieve 
them.  Yes.  ...  I  agree  that  I  think  in  that 
way.  ...  I  have  not  thought  much  before  of  the 
way  in  which  I  think  about  things — but  I  agree 
that  it  is  in  that  way.  Whatever  enterprises  man- 
kind attempts  are  limited  by  the  sum  total  of  that 
store  of  fuel  upon  the  planet.  That  is  very  much 
in  my  mind.  Besides  thai  he  1ms  nothing  but  his 
annual  allowance  of  energy  from  the  sun." 

"I  thought  that  presently  we  were  to  get  un- 
limited energy  from  atoms,"  said  the  doctor. 

"I  don't  believe  in  thai  as  a  thing  immediately 
practicable.  No  doubt  getting  a  supply  of  energy 
from  atoms  is  a  theoretical  possibility, — just  as 
flying  was  in  the  time  of  D.rdalus;  probably  there 
were  actual  attempts  nl  some  sort  of  glider  in 
ancient  Crete.    But  before  we  get  to  the  actual 


84    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

utilization  of  atomic  energy  there  will  be  ten  thou- 
sand difficult  corners  to  turn ;  we  may  have  to  wait 
three  or  four  thousand  years  for  it.  We  cannot 
count  on  it.  We  haven't  it  in  hand.  There  may 
be  some  impasse.  All  we  have  surely  is  coal  and 
oil, — there  is  no  surplus  of  wood  now — only  an 
annual  growth.  And  water-power  is  income  also, 
doled  out  day  by  day.  We  cannot  anticipate  it. 
Coal  and  oil  are  our  only  capital.  They  are  all 
we  have  for  great  important  efforts.  They  are 
a  gift  to  mankind  to  use  to  some  supreme  end  or 
to  waste  in  trivialities.  Coal  is  the  key  to  metal- 
lurgy and  oil  to  transit.  When  they  are  done  we 
shall  either  have  built  up  such  a  fabric  of  ap- 
paratus, knowledge  and  social  organization  that 
we  shall  be  able  to  manage  without  them — or 
we  shall  have  travelled  a  long  way  down  the 
slopes  of  waste  towards  extinction.  .  .  .  To-day, 
in  getting,  in  distribution,  in  use  we  waste  enor- 
mously. ...  As  we  sit  here  all  the  world  is  wast- 
ing fuel — fantastically. ' ' 

"Just  as  mentally — educationally  we  waste," 
the  doctor  interjected. 

"And  my  job  is  to  stop  what  I  can  of  that  waste, 
to  do  what  I  can  to  organize,  first  of  all  sane  fuel 
getting  and  then  sane  fuel  using.  And  that  second 
proposition  carries  us  far.  Into  the  whole  use 
we  are  making  of  life. 

"First  things  first,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "If 
we  set  about  getting  fuel  sanely,  if  we  do  it  as  the 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  85 

deliberate,  co-operative  act  of  the  whole  species, 
then  it  follows  that  we  shall  look  very  closely  into 
the  use  that  is  being  made  of  it.  When  all  the  fuel 
getting  is  brought  into  one  view  as  a  common  in- 
terest, then  it  follows  that  all  the  fuel  burning  will 
be  brought  into  one  view.  At  present  we  are  get- 
ting fuel  in  a  kind  of  scramble  with  no  general  aim. 
We  waste  and  lose  almost  as  much  as  we  get.  And 
of  what  we  get,  the  waste  is  idiotic. 

"I  won't  trouble  you,"  said  Sir  Richmond, 
"with  any  long  discourse  on  the  ways  of  getting 
fuel  in  this  country.  But  land  as  you  know  is 
owned  in  patches  and  stretches  that  were  deter- 
mined in  the  first  place  chiefly  by  agricultural 
necessities.  When  it  was  divided  up  among  its 
present  owners  nobody  was  thinking  about  the 
minerals  beneath.  But  the  lawyers  settled  long 
ago  that  the  landowner  owned  his  land  right  down 
to  the  centre  of  the  earth.  So  we  have  the  super- 
ficial landlord  as  coal  owner  trying  to  work  his 
coal  according  to  the  superficial  divisions,  quite 
irrespective  of  the  lie  of  the  coal  underneath. 
Each  man  goes  for  the  coal  under  his  own  land 
in  his  own  fashion.  You  get  three  shafts  where 
one  would  suffice  and  none  of  them  in  the  best  pos- 
sible place.  You  get  the  coal  coming  out  of  this 
point  when  it  would  be  far  more  convenient  to 
bring  it  out  at  that — miles  away.  You  get  bound- 
ary walls  of  coal  lid  ween  the  estates,  abandoned, 
left  in  Hie  ground  i'<'         p.    And  each  coal  owner 


86    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

sells  his  coal  in  his  own  pettifogging  manner.  .  .  . 
But  you  know  of  these  things.  You  know  too  how 
we  trail  the  coal  all  over  the  country,  spoiling 
it  as  we  trail  it,  until  at  last  we  get  it  into  the 
silly  coal  scuttles  beside  the  silly,  wasteful,  air- 
poisoning,  fog-creating  fireplace. 

''And  this  stuff,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  bringing 
his  hand  down  so  smartly  on  the  table  that  the 
startled  coffee  cups  cried  out  upon  the  tray;  "was 
given  to  men  to  give  them  power  over  metals,  to 
get  knowledge  with,  to  get  more  power  with.  .  .  ." 

"The  oil  story,  I  suppose,  is  as  bad." 

"The  oil  story  is  worse.  .  .  . 

"There  is  a  sort  of  cant,"  said  Sir  Richmond 
in  a  fierce  parenthesis,  "that  the  supplies  of  oil 
are  inexhaustible — that  you  can  muddle  about 
with  oil  anyhow.  .  .  .  Optimism  of  knaves  and  im- 
beciles. .  .  .  They  don't  want  to  be  pulled  up  by 
any  sane  considerations.  ..." 

For  some  moments  he  kept  silence — as  if  in 
unspeakable  commination. 

"Here  I  am  with  some  clearness  of  vision — my 
only  gift ;  not  very  clever,  with  a  natural  bad  tem- 
per, and  a  strong  sexual  bias,  doing  what  I  can 
to  get  a  broader  handling  of  the  fuel  question — as 
a  common  interest  for  all  mankind.  And  I  find 
myself  up  against  a  lot  of  men,  subtle  men,  sharp 
men,  obstinate  men,  prejudiced  men,  able  to  get 
round  me,  able  to  get  over  me,  able  to  blockade 
me.  .  .  .  Clever  men — yes,  and  all  of  them  ulti- 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  87 

mately  damned — oh !  utterly  damned — fools.  Coal 
owners  who  think  only  of  themselves,  solicitors 
who  think  backwards,  politicians  who  think  like  a 
game  of  cat's-cradle,  not  a  gleam  of  generosity — 
not  a  gleam." 

"What  particularly  are  you  working  for?" 
asked  the  doctor. 

"I  want  to  get  the  whole  business  of  the  world's 
fuel  discussed  and  reported  upon  as  one  affair — 
so  that  some  day  it  may  be  handled  as  one  affair — 
in  the  general  interest." 

"The  world,  did  you  say!  You  meant  the 
empire?" 

1 '  No,  the  world.  It  is  all  one  system  now.  You 
can't  work  it  in  bits.  I  want  to  call  in  foreign 
representatives  from  the  beginning." 

' '  A  dvisory — consultative  ? ' ' 

"No.  With  powers.  These  things  interlock 
now  internationally  both  through  labour  and 
finance.  The  sooner  we  scrap  this  nonsense  about 
an  autonomous  British  Empire  complete  in  itself, 
contra  mundum,  the  better  for  us.  A  world  con- 
trol is  fifty  years  overdue.  Hence  these 
disorders." 

"Still, — it's  rather  a  difficult  proposition,  as 
things  are." 

"Oh,  Lord!  don't  I  know  it's  difficult!"  cried 
Sir  Richmond  in  Hie  tone  of  one  who  swears. 
"Don't  I  know  thnf  perhaps  it's  impossible!  But 
it's  the  only  way  to  do  it.    Therefore,  I  say,  let's 


88    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

try  to  get  it  done.  And  everybody  says,  'difficult, 
difficult,'  and  nobody  lifts  a  finger  to  try.  And 
the  only  real  difficulty  is  that  everybody  for  one 
reason  or  another  says  that  it's  difficult.  It's 
against  human  nature.  Granted!  Every  decent 
thing  is.  It's  socialism.  Who  cares?  Along  this 
line  of  comprehensive  scientific  control  the  world 
has  to  go  or  it  will  retrogress,  it  will  muddle  and 
rot.  .  .  ." 

"I  agree,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 

"So  I  want  a  report  to  admit  that  distinctly. 
I  want  it  to  go  further  than  that.  I  want  to  get 
the  beginnings,  the  germ,  of  a  world  administra- 
tion. I  want  to  set  up  a  permanent  world  commis- 
sion of  scientific  men  and  economists — with  pow- 
ers, just  as  considerable  powers  as  I  can  give  them 
— they'll  be  feeble  powers  at  the  best — but  still 
some  sort  of  say  in  the  whole  fuel  supply  of  the 
world.  A  say — that  may  grow  at  last  to  a  control. 
A  right  to  collect  reports  and  receive  accounts  for 
example,  to  begin  with.  And  then  the  right  to 
make  recommendations.  .  .  .  You  see?  .  .  .  No, 
the  international  part  is  not  the  most  difficult  part 
of  it.  But  my  beastly  owners  and  their  beastly 
lawyers  won't  relinquish  a  scrap  of  what  they  call 
their  freedom  of  action.  And  my  labour  men,  be- 
cause I'm  a  fairly  big  coal  owner  myself,  sit  and 
watch  and  suspect  me,  too  stupid  to  grasp  what  I 
am  driving  at  and  too  incompetent  to  get  out  a 
scheme  of  their  own.    They  want  a  world  control 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  89 

on  scientific  lines  even  less  than  the  owners.  They 
try  to  think  that  fuel  production  can  carry  an  un- 
limited wages  bill  and  the  owners  try  to  think 
that  it  can  pay  unlimited  profits,  and  when  I  say ; 
'  This  business  is  something  more  than  a  scramble 
for  profits  and  wages ;  it's  a  service  and  a  common 

interest,'  they  stare  at  me "  Sir  Richmond 

was  at  a  loss  for  an  image.  ' '  Like  a  committee  in 
a  thieves'  kitchen  when  someone  has  casually 
mentioned  the  law." 

"But  will  you  ever  get  your  Permanent  Commis- 
sion?" 

"It  can  be  done.    If  I  can  stick  it  out." 
"But  with  the  whole  Committee  against  you!" 
"The  curious  thing  is  that  the  whole  Committee 
isn't  against  me.    Every  individual  is.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  found  it  difficult  to  express.  "The 
psychology  of  my  Committee  ought  to  interest 
you.  ...  It  is  probably  a  fair  sample  of  the  way 
all  sorts  of  things  are  going  nowadays.  It's  curi- 
ous. .  .  .  There  is  not  a  man  on  that  Committee 
who  is  quite  comfortable  within  himself  about  the 
particular  individual  end  he  is  there  to  serve.  It's 
there  I  get  them.  They  pursue  their  own  ends 
bitterly  and  obstinately  I  admit,  but  they  are  bit- 
ter and  obstinate  because  they  pursue  them 
against  an  internal  opposition — which  is  on  my 
side.  They  are  terrified  to  think,  if  once  they 
stopped  fighting  me,  how  far  they  might  not  have 
to  go  with  me." 


90  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"A  suppressed  world  conscience  in  fact.  This 
marches  very  closely  with  my  own  ideas " 

"A  world  conscience?  "World  conscience?  I 
don't  know.  But  I  do  know  that  there  is  this  drive 
in  nearly  every  member  of  the  Committee,  some 
drive  anyhow,  towards  the  decent  thing.  It  is  the 
same  drive  that  drives  me.  But  I  am  the  most 
driven.  It  has  turned  me  round.  It  hasn't  turned 
them.  I  go  East  and  they  go  West.  And  they 
don't  want  to  be  turned  round.  Tremendously, 
they  don't." 

11 Creative  undertow,"  said  Dr.  Martineau,  mak- 
ing notes,  as  it  were.  "An  increasing  force  in 
modern  life.  In  the  psychology  of  a  new  age — 
strengthened  by  education — it  may  play  a  direc- 
tive part." 

"They  fight  every  little  point.  But,  you  see, 
because  of  this  creative  undertow — if  you  like  to 
call  it  that — we  do  get  along.  I  am  leader  or  whip- 
per-in, it  is  hard  to  say  which,  of  a  bolting  flock. 
...  I  believe  they  will  report  for  a  permanent 
world  commission;  I  believe  I  have  got  them  up 
to  that ;  but  they  will  want  to  make  it  a  bureau  of 
this  League  of  Nations,  and  I  have  the  profound- 
est  distrust  of  this  League  of  Nations.  It  may 
turn  out  to  be  a  sort  of  side-tracking  arrangement 
for  all  sorts  of  important  world  issues.  And  they 
will  find  they  have  to  report  for  some  sort  of  con- 
trol. But  there  again  they  will  shy.  They  will 
report  for  it  and  then  they  will  do  their  utmost  to 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  91 

whittle  it  down  again.  They  will  refuse  it  the 
most  reasonable  powers.  They  will  alter  the 
composition  of  the  Committee  so  as  to  make  it 
innocuous." 

"How?" 

1 '  Get  rid  of  the  independent  scientific  men,  load 
it  up  so  far  as  Britain  is  concerned  with  muck  of 
the  colonial  politician  type  and  tame  labour  repre- 
sentatives, balance  with  shady  new  adventurer 
millionaires,  get  in  still  shadier  stuff  from  abroad, 
let  these  gentry  appoint  their  own  tame  experts 
after  their  own  hearts, — experts  who  will  make 
merely  advisory  reports,  which  will  not  be  pub- 
lished. ..." 

"They  want  in  fact  to  keep  the  old  system  go- 
ing under  the  cloak  of  your  Committee,  reduced  to 
a  cloak  and  nothing  more?" 

"That  is  what  it  amounts  to.  They  want  to 
have  the  air  of  doing  right — indeed  they  do  want 
to  have  the  feel  of  doing  right — and  still  leave 
things  just  exactly  what  they  were  before.  And  as 
I  suffer  under  the  misfortune  of  seeing  the  thing 
rather  more  clearly,  I  have  to  shepherd  the  con- 
science of  the  whole  ( lommittee.  .  .  .  But  there  is 
a  conscience  there.  If  I  can  hold  out  myself,  I 
can  hold  the  Committee." 

He  turned  appealingly  to  the  doctor.  "Why 
should  I  have  to  be  the  conscience  of  that  damned 
Committee!  Why  should  I  do  this  exhausting  in- 
human   job?  ...  In    their    hearts    these    others 


92  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

know.  .  .  .  Only  they  won't  know.  .  .  .  Why 
should  it  fall  on  me  1 ' ' 

"You  have  to  go  through  with  it,"  said  Dr. 
Martineau. 

"I  have  to  go  through  with  it,  but  it's  a  hell 
of  utterly  inglorious  squabbling.  They  bait  me. 
They  have  been  fighting  the  same  fight  within 
themselves  that  they  fight  with  me.  They  know 
exactly  where  I  am,  that  I  too  am  doing  my  job 
against  internal  friction.  The  one  thing  before 
all  others  that  they  want  to  do  is  to  bring  me  down 
off  my  moral  high  horse.  And  I  loathe  the  high 
horse.  I  am  in  a  position  of  special  moral  supe- 
riority to  men  who  are  on  the  whole  as  good  men 
as  I  am  or  better.  That  shows  all  the  time.  You 
see  the  sort  of  man  I  am.  I've  a  broad  streak  of 
personal  vanity.  I  fag  easily.  I'm  short-tem- 
pered. I've  other  things,  as  you  perceive.  When 
I  fag  I  become  obtuse,  I  repeat  and  bore,  I  get 
viciously  ill-tempered,  I  suffer  from  an  intolerable 
sense  of  ill  usage.  Then  that  ass,  Wagstaffe,  who 
ought  to  be  working  with  me  steadily,  sees  his 
chance  to  be  pleasantly  witty.  He  gets  a  laugh 
round  the  table  at  my  expense.  Young  Dent,  the 
more  intelligent  of  the  labour  men,  reads  me  a  lec- 
ture in  committee  manners.  Old  Cassidy  sees  his 
opening  and  jabs  some  ridiculous  petty  accusa- 
tion at  me  and  gets  me  spluttering  self-defence 
like  a  fool.  All  my  stock  goes  down,  and  as  my 
stock  goes  down  the  chances  of  a  good  report 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  93 

dwindle.  Young  Dent  grieves  to  see  me  injuring 
my  own  case.  Too  damned  a  fool  to  see  what  will 
happen  to  the  report!  You  see  if  only  they  can 
convince  themselves  I  am  just  a  prig  and  an  ego- 
tist and  an  impractical  bore,  they  escape  from  a 
great  deal  more  than  my  poor  propositions.  They 
escape  from  the  doubt  in  themselves.  By  dismiss- 
ing me  they  dismiss  their  own  consciences.  And 
then  they  can  scamper  off  and  be  sensible  little 
piggy-wigs  and  not  bother  any  more  about  what 
is  to  happen  to  mankind  in  the  long  run.  .  .  .  Do 
you  begin  to  realize  the  sort  of  fight,  upside  down 
in  a  dustbin,  that  that  Committee  is  for  me?" 

"You  have  to  go  through  with  it,"  Dr.  Marti- 
neau  repeated. 

1 '  I  have.  If  I  can.  But  I  warn  you  I  have  been 
near  breaking  point.  And  if  I  tumble  off  the  high 
horse,  if  I  can't  keep  going  regularly  there  to  ride 
the  moral  high  horse,  that  Committee  will  slump 
into  utter  scoundrelism.  It  will  turn  out  a  long, 
inconsistent,  botched,  unreadable  report  that  will 
back  up  all  sorts  of  humbugging  bargains  and 
sham  settlements.  It  will  contain  some  half-bakod 
scheme  to  pacify  the  minors  at  the  expense  of  the 
general  welfare.  It  won't  even  succeed  in  doing 
that.  But  in  the  general  confusion  old  Cassidv 
will  gel  away  with  a  scries  of  hauls  thai  may  run 
into  millions.  Which  will  last  his  time— damn 
him!  And  that  is  whore  we  are.  .  .  .  Oh  !  I  know! 
I  know!  .  .  .  I  must  do  this  job.    I  don 't  need  any 


94  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

telling  that  my  life  will  be  nothing  and  mean 
nothing  unless  I  bring  this  thing  through.  .  .  . 

"But  the  thanklessness  of  playing  this  lone 
hand!" 

The  doctor  watched  his  friend's  resentful  black 
silhouette  against  the  lights  on  the  steely  river, 
and  said  nothing  for  awhile. 

"Why  did  I  ever  undertake  to  play  it?"  Sir 
Eichmond  appealed.  "Why  has  it  been  put  upon 
me?  Seeing  what  a  poor  thing  I  am,  why  am  I 
not  a  poor  thing  altogether?" 

*  8 

"I  think  I  understand  that  loneliness  of  yours," 
said  the  doctor  after  an  interval. 

"I  am  intolerable  to  myself." 

"And  I  think  it  explains  why  it  is  that  you  turn 
to  women  as  you  do.  You  want  help;  you  want 
reassurance.   And  you  feel  they  can  give  it. ' ' 

"I  wonder  if  it  has  been  quite  like  that,"  Sir 
Richmond  reflected. 

By  an  effort  Dr.  Martineau  refrained  from  men- 
tioning the  mother  complex.  "You  want  help  and 
reassurance  as  a  child  does,"  he  said.  "Women 
and  women  alone  seem  capable  of  giving  that,  of 
telling  you  that  you  are  surely  right,  that  notwith- 
standing your  blunders  you  are  right;  that  even 
when  you  are  wrong  it  doesn't  so  much  matter, 
you  are  still  in  spirit  right.    They  can  show  their 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  95 

belief  in  you  as  no  man  can.  With  all  their  being 
they  can  do  that." 

"Yes,  I  suppose  they  could." 

1 '  They  can-  You  have  said  already  tjiat  women 
are  necessary  to  make  things  real  for  you." 

*  *  Not  my  work, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond.  l *  I  admit 
that  it  might  be  like  that,  but  it  isn't  like  that. 
It  has  not  worked  out  like  that.  The  two  drives 
go  on  side  by  side  in  me.  They  have  no  logical 
connexion.  All  I  can  say  is  that  for  me,  with  my 
bifid  temperament,  one  makes  a  rest  from  the 
other,  and  is  so  far  refreshment  and  a  renewal  of 
energ)r.  But  I  do  not  find  women  coming  into  my 
work  in  any  effectual  way. ' ' 

The  doctor  reflected  further.  "I  suppose,"  he 
began  and  stopped  short. 

He  heard  Sir  Richmond  move  in  his  chair, 
creaking  an  interrogation. 

"You  have  never,"  said  the  doctor,  "turned  to 
the  idea  of  God?" 

Sir  Richmond  grunted  and  made  no  other  an- 
swer for  the  better  part  of  a  minute. 

As  Dr.  Martineau  wailed  for  his  companion  to 
speak,  a  falling  star  si  leaked  the  deep  blue  above 
them. 

"1  can't  believe  in  a  Cod,"  .said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Something  after  the  fashion  of  a  God,"  said 
the  doctor  Insidiously. 

"No,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "Nothing  that 
reassures." 


96  SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"But  this  loneliness,  this  craving  for  compan- 
ionship  " 

"We  have  all  been  through  that, "  said  Sir  Eich- 
mond.  "We  have  all  in  our  time  lain  very  still  in 
the  darkness  with  our  souls  crying  out  for  the 
fellowship  of  God,  demanding  some  sign,  some 
personal  response.  The  faintest  feeling  of  assur- 
ance would  have  satisfied  us. ' ' 

"And  there  has  never  been  a  response?" 

"Have  you  ever  had  a  response?" 

"Once  I  seemed  to  have  a  feeling  of  exaltation 
and  security." 

"Well?" 

"Perhaps  I  only  persuaded  myself  that  I  had. 
I  had  been  reading  William  James  on  religious  ex- 
periences and  I  was  thinking  very  much  of  '  Con- 
version.' .  .  ..,  I  tried  to  experience  Conver- 
sion. ..." 

"Yes?" 

"It  faded." 

"It  always  fades,"  said  Sir  Eichmond  with 
anger  in  his  voice.  "I  wonder  how  many  people 
there  are  nowadays  who  have  passed  through  this 
last  experience  of  ineffectual  invocation,  this  ap- 
peal to  the  fading  shadow  of  a  vanished  God.  In 
the  night.  In  utter  loneliness.  'Answer  me! 
Speak  to  me!'  Does  he  answer?  In  the  silence 
you  hear  the  little  blood  vessels  whisper  in  your 
ears.  You  see  a  faint  glow  of  colour  on  the 
darkness.  ..." 


AT  MAIDENHEAD  97 

Dr.  Martineau  sat  without  a  word. 

"I  can  believe  that  over  all  things  Righteous- 
ness  rules.  I  can  believe  that.  But  Righteousness 
is  not  friendliness  nor  mercy  nor  comfort  nor  any 
such  dear  and  intimate  things.  This  cuddling  up 
to  Righteousness !  It  is  a  dream,  a  delusion  and  a 
phase.  I've  tried  all  that  long  ago.  I've  given  it 
up  long  ago.  I  've  grown  out  of  it.  Men  do — after 
forty.  Our  souls  were  made  in  the  squatting- 
place  of  the  submen  of  ancient  times.  They  are 
made  out  of  primitive  needs  and  they  die  before 
our  bodies  as  those  needs  are  satisfied.  Only 
young  people  have  souls,  complete.  The  need  for 
a  personal  God,  feared  but  reassuring,  is  a  youth's 
need.  I  no  longer  fear  the  Old  Man  nor  want  to 
propitiate  the  Old  Man  nor  believe  he  matters  any 
more.  I'm  a  bit  of  an  Old  Alan  myself  1  dis- 
cover. Yes.  .  .  .  But  the  other  thing  still 
remains." 

"The  Great  Mother  of  the  Gods,"  said  Dr. 
Martineau — still  clinging  to  his  theories. 

"The  need  of  the  woman,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
"I  want  mating  because  it  is  my  nature  to  mate. 
I  want  fellowship  because  I  am  a  social  animal — 
and  I  want  it  from  another  social  animal.  Not 
from  any  Clod — any  inconceivable  God.  Who 
fades  and  disappea rs.    No.  .   .   . 

"Perhaps  that  other  need  will  fade  presently. 
I  do  not  know.  Perhaps  it  lasts  as  long  as  life 
does.    How  can  I  tell?  .  .  ." 


98     SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  was  silent  for  a  little  while.  Then  his  voice 
sounded  in  the  night,  as  if  he  spoke  to  himself. 
''But  as  for  the  God  of  All  Things  consoling  and 
helping !  Imagine  it !  That  up  there — having  fel- 
lowship with  me !  I  would  as  soon  think  of  cooling 
my  throat  with  the  Milky  Way  or  shaking  hands 
with  those  stars." 


CHAPTER  THE  FIFTH 

IN   THE    LAND   OF    THE    FORGOTTEN    PEOPLES 

§    1 

A  gust  of  confidence  on  the  part  of  a  person 
naturally  or  habitually  reserved  will  often  be  fol- 
lowed by  a  phase  of  recoil.  At  breakfast  next 
morning  their  overnight  talk  seemed  to  both  Sir 
Richmond  and  Dr.  Martincau  like  something  each 
had  dreamt  about  the  other,  a  quite  impossible 
excess  of  intimacy.  They  discussed  the  weather, 
which  seemed  to  be  settling  down  to  the  utmost 
serenity  of  which  the  English  spring  is  capable, 
they  talked  of  Sir  Richmond's  coming  car  and  of 
the  possible  routes  before  them.  Sir  Richmond 
produced  the  Michelin  maps  which  he  had  taken 
out  of  the  pockets  of  the  little  Charmeuse.  The 
Bath  Road  lay  before  them,  he  explained,  Read- 
ing, Newbury,  Bungerford,  Marlborough,  Silbury 
Hill  which  overhangs  Avebnry.  Both  travellers 
discovered  a  common  excitement  at  the  mention 

of  Avebury  and  Silbury   Hill.     Both   tool  an   in- 
telligent   interest    in   archaeology.     Both  had  been 

greatly  stimulated  by  the  recent  work  of  Elliot 

Smith  and  Rivers  upon  what  was  then  known  as 

99 


100         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  Heliolithic  culture.  It  had  revived  their  in- 
terest in  Avebury  and  Stonehenge.  The  doctor 
moreover  had  been  reading  Hippisley  Cox's  Green 
Roads  of  England. 

Neither  gentleman  had  ever  seen  Avebury,  but 
Dr.  Martineau  had  once  visited  Stonehenge. 

"Avebury  is  much  the  oldest,"  said  the  doctor. 
"They  must  have  made  Silbury  Hill  long  before 
2000  b.c.  It  may  be  five  thousand  years  old 
or  even  more.  It  is  the  most  important  his- 
torical relic  in  the  British  Isles.  And  the  most 
neglected.' ' 

They  exchanged  archaeological  facts.  The 
secret  places  of  the  heart  rested  until  the 
afternoon. 

Then  Sir  Richmond  saw  fit  to  amplify  his  con- 
fessions in  one  particular. 


$2 

The  doctor  and  his  patient  had  discovered  a 
need  for  exercise  as  the  morning  advanced.  They 
had  walked  by  the  road  to  Marlow  and  had  lunched 
at  a  riverside  inn,  returning  after  a  restful  hour 
in  an  arbour  on  the  lawn  of  this  place  to  tea  at 
Maidenhead.  It  was  as  they  returned  that  Sir 
Richmond  took  up  the  thread  of  their  overnight 
conversation  again. 

"In  the  night,"  he  said,  "I  was  thinking  over 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  101 

the  account  I  tried  to  give  you  of  my  motives.  A 
lot  of  it  was  terribly  out  of  drawing. ' ' 

"Facts?"  asked  the  doctor. 

"No,  the  facts  were  all  right.  It  was  the  at- 
mosphere, the  proportions.  ...  I  don't  know  if 
I  gave  you  the  effect  of  something  Don  Juan- 
esque?  ..." 

"Vulgar  poem,"  said  the  doctor  remarkably. 
"I  discounted  that." 

"Vulgar!" 

"Intolerable.  Byron  in  sexual  psychology  is 
like  a  stink  in  a  kitchen." 

Sir  Richmond  perceived  he  had  struck  upon  the 
sort  of  thing  that  used  to  be  called  a  pet  aversion. 

"I  don't  want  you  to  think  that  I  run  about 
after  women  in  an  habitual  and  systematic  man- 
ner. Or  that  I  deliberately  hunt  them  in  the  in- 
terests of  my  work  and  energy.  Your  questions 
had  set  me  theorizing  about  myself.  And  I  did 
my  best  to  improvise  a  scheme  of  motives  yester- 
day. It  was,  I  perceive,  a  jerry-built  scheme,  run 
up  at  short  notice.  My  nocturnal  reflections  con- 
vinced me  of  that.  1  put  reason  into  things 
that  are  essentially  instinctive.  The  truth  is  that 
the  wanderings  of  desire  have  no  single  drive. 
All  sorts  of  motives  come  in,  high  and  low,  down 
to  sheer  vulgar  imitativeness  and  competitiveness. 
What  was  true  in  it  all  was  this,  that  a  man  with 
any  imagination  in  a  fatigue  phase  falls  natu- 
rally  into   these   complications  because   they  are 


102        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

more  attractive  to  his  type  and  far  easier  and 
more  refreshing  to  the  mind,  at  the  outset,  than 
anything  else.  And  they  do  work  a  sort  of  re- 
covery in  him.  They  send  him  back  to  his  work  re- 
freshed— so  far,  that  is,  as  his  work  is  concerned. ' ' 

1 'At  the  outset  they  are  easier,"  said  the 
doctor. 

Sir  Richmond  laughed.  ''When  one  is  fagged 
it  is  only  the  outset  counts.  The  more  tired  one 
is  the  more  readily  one  moves  along  the  line  of 
least  resistance.  .  .  . 

"That  is  one  footnote  to  what  I  said.  So  far 
as  the  motive  of  my  work  goes,  I  think  we  got 
something  like  the  spirit  of  it.  What  I  said  about 
that  was  near  the  truth  of  things.  .  .  . 

"But  there  is  another  set  of  motives  alto- 
gether, ' '  Sir  Richmond  went  on  with  an  air  of  hav- 
ing cleared  the  ground  for  his  real  business, 
"that  I  didn't  go  into  at  all  yesterday." 

He  considered.  "It  arises  out  of  these  other 
affairs.  Before  you  realize  it  your  affections 
are  involved.  I  am  a  man  much  swayed  by  my 
affections." 

Mr.  Martineau  glanced  at  him.  There  was  a 
note  of  genuine  self-reproach  in  Sir  Richmond's 
voice. 

"I  get  fond  of  people.  It  is  quite  irrational, 
but  I  get  fond  of  them.  Which  is  quite  a  different 
tiling  from  the  admiration  and  excitement  of  fall- 
ing in  love.    Almost  the  opposite  thing.    They  cry 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  103 

or  they  come  some  mental  or  physical  cropper  and 
hurt  themselves,  or  they  do  something  distress- 
ingly little  and  human  and  suddenly  I  find  they've 
got  me.  I'm  distressed.  I'm  filled  with  something 
between  pity  and  an  impulse  of  responsibility. 
I  become  tender  towards  them.  I  am  impelled  to 
take  care  of  them.  I  want  to  ease  them  off,  to  re- 
assure them,  to  make  them  stop  hurting  at  any 
cost.  I  don't  see  why  it  should  be  the  weak  and 
sickly  and  seamy  side  of  people  that  grips  me  most, 
but  it  is.  I  don't  know  why  it  should  be  their 
failures  that  gives  them  power  over  me,  but  it  is. 
I  told  you  of  this  girl,  this  mistress  of  mine,  who 
is  ill  just  now.  She's  got  me  in  that  way;  she's 
got  me  tremendously." 

"You  did  not  speak  of  her  yesterday  with  any 
morbid  excess  of  pity,"  the  doctor  was  constrained 
to  remark. 

"I  abused  her  very  probably.  I  forget  exactly 
what  I  said.  ..." 

The  doctor  offered  no  assistance. 

"But  the  reason  why  I  abuse  her  is  perfectly 
plain.  I  abuse  her  because  she  distresses  me  by 
her  misfortunes  and  instead  of  my  getting  any- 
thing out  of  her,  I  go  out  to  her.  But  I  do  go  out 
to  her.  All  this  time  at  the  back  of  my  mind  I  am 
worrying  about  her.  She  has  that  gift  of  making 
one  feel  for  her.  I  am  feeling  that  damned  car- 
buncle almost  as  il*  it  had  been  my  affair  instead 
of  hers. 


104        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"That  carbuncle  has  made  me  suffer — fright- 
fully. .  .  .    Why  should  I?    It  isn't  mine." 

He  regarded  the  doctor  earnestly.  The  doctor 
controlled  a  strong  desire  to  laugh. 

"I  suppose  the  young  lady "  he  began. 

"Oh!  she  puts  in  suffering  all  right.  I've  no 
doubt  about  that. 

"I  suppose,"  Sir  Richmond  went  on,  "now  that 
I  have  told  you  so  much  of  this  affair,  I  may  as 
well  tell  you  all.  It  is  a  sort  of  comedy,  a  pain- 
ful comedy,  of  irrelevant  affections.  ..." 

The  doctor  was  prepared  to  be  a  good  listener. 
Facts  he  would  always  listen  to ;  it  was  only  when 
people  told  him  their  theories  that  he  would  in- 
terrupt with  his  "Exactly." 

"This  young  woman  is  a  person  of  consider- 
able genius.  I  don't  know  if  you  have  seen  in 
the  illustrated  papers  a  peculiar  sort  of  humorous 
illustrations  usually  with  a  considerable  amount 
of  bite  in  them  over  the  name  of  Martin  Leeds?" 

"Extremely  amusing  stuff." 

"It  is  that  Martin  Leeds.  I  met  her  at  the  be- 
ginning of  her  career.  She  talks  almost  as  well  as 
she  draws.  She  amused  me  immensely.  I'm  not 
the  sort  of  man  who  waylays  and  besieges  women 
and  girls.  I  'm  not  the  pursuing  type.  But  I  per- 
ceived that  in  some  odd  way  I  attracted  her  and 
I  was  neither  wise  enough  nor  generous  enough 
not  to  let  the  thing  develop." 

"H'm,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  105 

"I'd  never  had  to  do  with  an  intellectually  bril- 
liant woman  before.  I  see  now  that  the  more 
imaginative  force  a  woman  has,  the  more  likely 
she  is  to  get  into  a  state  of  extreme  self-aban- 
donment with  any  male  thing  upon  which  her  im- 
agination begins  to  crystallize.  Before  I  came 
along  she'd  mixed  chiefly  with  a  lot  of  young  art- 
ists and  students,  all  doing  nothing  at  all  except 
talk  about  the  things  they  were  going  to  do.  I 
suppose  I  profited  by  the  contrast,  being  older 
and  with  my  hands  full  of  affairs.  Perhaps  some- 
thing had  happened  that  had  made  her  recoil 
towards  my  sort  of  thing.  I  don't  know.  But  she 
just  let  herself  go  at  me." 

"And  you?" 

"Let  myself  go  too.  I'd  never  met  anything 
like  her  before.  It  was  her  wit  took  me.  It 
didn't  occur  to  me  that  she  wasn't  my  contem- 
porary and  as  able  as  I  was.  As  able  to  take  care 
of  herself.  All  sorts  of  considerations  that  I 
should  have  shown  to  a  sillier  woman  I  never 
dreamt  of  showing  to  her.  I  had  never  met  any- 
one so  mentally  brilliant  before  or  so  helpless  and 
headlong.  And  so  here  we  are  on  each  other's 
hands!" 

"But  the  child!" 

"It  happened  to  us.  For  four  years  now  things 
have  just  happened  to  us.  All  the  lime  I  have 
been  overworking,  firsl  al  explosives  and  now  at 
this  fuel  business.     She  loo  is  full  of  her  work. 


106         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Nothing  stops  that  though  everything  seems  to 
interfere  with  it.  And  in  a  distraught,  preoc- 
cupied way  we  are  abominably  fond  of  each  other. 
'Fond'  is  the  word.  But  we  are  both  too  busy  to 
look  after  either  ourselves  or  each  other. 

"She  is  much  more  incapable  than  I  am,"  said 
Sir  Richmond  as  if  he  delivered  a  weighed  and 
very  important  judgment. 

"You  see  very  much  of  each  other ?" 
"She  has  a  flat  in  Chelsea  and  a  little  cottage 
in  South  Cornwall,  and  we  sometimes  snatch  a  few 
days  together,  away  somewhere  in  Surrey  or  up 
the  Thames  or  at  such  a  place  as  Southend  where 
one  is  lost  in  a  crowd  of  inconspicuous  people. 
When  things  go  well — they  usually  go  well  at  the 
start — we  are  glorious  companions.  She  is  happy, 
she  is  creative,  she  will  light  up  a  new  place  with 
flashes  of  humour,  with  a  keenness  of  apprecia- 
tion. ..." 
"But  things  do  not  always  go  well?" 
"Things,"  said  Sir  Richmond  with  the  delibera- 
tion of  a  man  who  measures  his  words,  "are  apt 
to  go  wrong.  ...  At  the  flat  there  is  constant 
trouble  with  the  servants;  they  bully  her.  A 
woman  is  more  entangled  with  servants  than  a 
man.  "Women  in  that  position  seem  to  resent  the 
work  and  freedom  of  other  women.  Her  servants 
won't  leave  her  in  peace  as  they  would  leave  a 
man ;  they  make  trouble  for  her.  .   .   .  And  when 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  107 

we  have  had  a  few  days  anywhere  away,  even  if 
nothing  in  particular  has  gone  wrong " 

Sir  Richmond  stopped  short. 

' '  When  they  go  wrong  it  is  generally  her  fault  ? ' ' 
the  doctor  sounded. 

''Almost  always." 

"But  if  they  don't?"  said  the  psychiatrist. 

"It  is  difficult  to  describe.  .  .  .  The  essential 
incompatibility  of  the  whole  thing  comes  out." 

The  doctor  maintained  his  expression  of  intel- 
ligent interest. 

' '  She  wants  to  go  on  with  her  work.  She  is  able 
to  work  anywhere.  All  she  wants  is  just  card- 
board and  ink.  My  mind  on  the  other  hand  turns 
back  to  the  Fuel  Commission.  ..." 

"Then  any  little  thing  makes  trouble." 

"Any  little  thing  makes  trouble.  And  we  al- 
ways drift  round  to  the  same  discussion;  whether 
we  ought  really  to  go  on  together." 

"It  is  you  begin  that?" 

"Yes,  1  start  that.  You  see  she  is  perfectly 
contented  when  i  am  about.  She  is  as  fond  of 
me  ae  I  am  of  her." 

"Fonder  perhaps." 

"]  don 'I  know.  But  she  is — adhesive.  Emo- 
tionally adhesive.  All  she  wants  to  do  is  jusl  to 
settle  down  when  I  am  there  and  go  on  with  her 
work.    Bui  then,  you  see,  there  is  my  work." 

"Exactly.  .  .  .    After  all  it  seems  to  me  that 


108        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

your  great  trouble  is  not  in  yourselves  but  in  so- 
cial institutions.  Which  haven't  yet  fitted  them- 
selves to  people  like  you  two.  It  is  the  sense  of 
uncertainty  makes  her,  as  you  say,  adhesive.  Ner- 
vously so.  If  we  were  indeed  living  in  a  new  age 
instead  of  the  moral  ruins  of  a  shattered  one " 

"We  can't  alter  the  age  we  live  in,"  said  Sir 
Richmond  a  little  testily. 

1 '  No.  Exactly.  But  we  can  realize,  in  any  par- 
ticular situation,  that  it  is  not  the  individuals 
to  blame  but  the  misfit  of  ideas  and  forms  and 
prejudices." 

"No,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  obstinately  reject- 
ing this  pacifying  suggestion;  "she  could  adapt 
herself.    If  she  cared  enough." 

"But  how?" 

"She  will  not  take  the  slightest  trouble  to 
adjust  herself  to  the  peculiarities  of  our  position. 
.  .  .  She  could  be  cleverer.  Other  women  are 
cleverer.  Any  other  woman  almost  would  be 
cleverer  than  she  is." 

"But  if  she  was  cleverer,  she  wouldn't  be  the 
genius  she  is.  She  would  just  be  any  other 
woman. ' ' 

"Perhaps  she  would,"  said  Sir  Richmond 
darkly  and  desperately.  "Perhaps  she  would. 
Perhaps  it  would  be  better  if  she  was." 

Dr.  Martineau  raised  his  eyebrows  in  a  furtive 
aside. 

"But  here  you  see  that  it  is  that  in  my  case, 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  109 

the  fundamental  incompatibility  between  one 's  af- 
fections and  one's  wider  conception  of  duty  and 
work  comes  in.  "We  cannot  change  social  insti- 
tutions in  a  year  or  a  lifetime.  We  can  never 
change  them  to  suit  an  individual  case.  That 
would  be  like  suspending  the  laws  of  gravitation 
in  order  to  move  a  piano.  As  things  are,  Martin 
is  no  good  to  me,  no  help  to  me.  She  is  a  rival 
to  my  duty.  She  feels  that.  She  is  hostile  to  my 
duty.  A  definite  antagonism  has  developed.  She 
feels  and  treats  fuel  and  everything  to  do  with 
fuel  as  a  bore.  It  is  an  attack.  We  quarrel  on 
that.  It  isn't  as  though  I  found  it  so  easy  to 
stick  to  my  work  that  I  could  disregard  her  hos- 
tility. And  I  can't  bear  to  part  from  her.  I 
threaten  it,  I  distress  her  excessively  and  then  I 
am  overcome  by  sympathy  for  her  and  I  go  back 
to  her.  ...  In  the  ordinary  course  of  things  I 
should  be  with  her  now." 

"If  it  wore  not  for  the  carbuncle ?" 

"If  it  were  not  for  the  carbuncle.  She  docs  not 
rare  for  me  to  sec  her  disfigured.  She  does  not  un- 
derstand  "    Sir  Richmond  was  al  a  loss  for 

a  phras< "thai  ii  is  qo1  her  icood  looks." 

"She  won't  let  you  go  to  her?" 

"It  amounts  to  that.  .  .  .  And  soon  there  will 
be  all  ili'1  trouble  about  educating  the  girl.  What- 
ever happens,  she  must  have  as  good  a  chance  as 
— anyone.  ..." 

1 '  Ah  !    That  is  worrying  you  too ! ' ' 


110    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 


<< 


:  Frightfully  at  times.  If  it  were  a  boy  it  would 
be  easier.  It  needs  constant  tact  and  dexterity 
to  fix  things  up.  Neither  of  us  have  any.  It 
needs  attention.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  mused  darkly. 

Dr.  Martineau  thought  aloud.  "An  incompe- 
tent delightful  person  with  Martin  Leeds's  sense 
of  humour.  And  her  powers  of  expression.  She 
must  be  attractive  to  many  people.  She  could 
probably  do  without  you.    If  once  you  parted. ' ' 

Sir  Richmond  turned  on  him  eagerly. 

"You  think  I  ought  to  part  from  her?  On  her 
account  ? ' ' 

1 '  On  her  account.  It  might  pain  her.  But  once 
the  thing  was  done " 

"I  want  to  part.    I  believe  I  ought  to  part." 

"Well?" 

"But  then  my  affection  comes  in." 

"That  extraordinary — tenderness  of  yours?" 

"I'm  afraid." 

"Of  what?" 

"Anyone  might  get  hold  of  her — if  I  let  her 
down.  She  hasn't  a  tithe  of  the  ordinary  cool- 
headed  calculation  of  an  average  woman.  .  .  . 
I've  a  duty  to  her  genius.  I've  got  to  take  care 
of  her." 

To  which  the  doctor  made  no  reply. 

"Nevertheless  the  idea  of  parting  has  been  very 
much  in  my  mind  lately." 

''Letting  her  go  free?" 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  111 

"You  can  put  it  in  that  way  if  you  like." 

"It  might  not  be  a  fatal  operation  for  either 
of  you." 

"And  yet  there  are  moods  when  parting  is  an 
intolerable  idea.  When  one  is  invaded  by  a  flood 
of  affection."  .  .  .  And  old  habits  of  association." 

Dr.  Martineau  thought.  Was  that  the  right 
word, — affection?    Perhaps  it  was. 

They  had  come  out  on  the  towing  path  close  by 
the  lock  and  they  found  themselves  threading 
their  way  through  a  little  crowd  of  boating  people 
and  lookers-on.  For  a  time  their  conversation 
was  broken.    Sir  Richmond  resumed  it. 

"But  this  is  where  we  cease  to  be  Man  on  his 
Planet  and  all  the  rest  of  it.  This  is  where  the 
idea  of  a  definite  task,  fanatically  followed  to  the 
exclusion  of  all  minor  considerations,  breaks 
down.  When  the  work  is  good,  when  we  are  sure 
we  are  all  right,  then  we  may  carry  off  things  with 
a  high  hand.  But  the  work  isn't  always  good,  we 
aren't  always  sure.  We  blunder,  we  make  a  mud- 
dle, we  are  fatigued.  Then  the  sacrificed  affec- 
tion .- ■com,  -in  as  accusers.  Then  it  is  that  we  want 
to  be  reassured." 

"And  then  it  is  that  Miss  Martin  Leeds ?" 

"Doesn't,"  Sir  Richmond  snapped. 

Came  a  long  pause. 

"And  yet 

"It  is  extraordinarily  difficult  to  think  of 
parting  from  Martin." 


112        SECRET  PLAGES  OF  THE  HEART 


§3 

In  the  evening  after  dinner  Dr.  Martineau 
sought,  rather  unsuccessfully,  to  go  on  with  the 
analysis  of  Sir  Richmond. 

But  Sir  Richmond  was  evidently  a  creature  of 
moods.  Either  he  regretted  the  extent  of  his  con- 
fidences or  the  slight  irrational  irritation  that  he 
felt  at  waiting  for  his  car  affected  his  attitude 
towards  his  companion,  or  Dr.  Martineau 's  tenta- 
tives  were  ill-chosen.  At  any  rate  he  would  not 
rise  to  any  conversational  bait  that  the  doctor 
could  devise.  The  doctor  found  this  the  more  re- 
grettable because  it  seemed  to  him  that  there  was 
much  to  be  worked  upon  in  this  Martin  Leeds  af- 
fair. He  was  inclined  to  think  that  she  and  Sir 
Richmond  were  unduly  obsessed  by  the  idea  that 
the}7-  had  to  stick  together  because  of  the  child, 
because  of  the  look  of  the  thing  and  so  forth,  and 
that  really  each  might  be  struggling  against  a 
very  strong  impulse  indeed  to  break  off  the  af- 
fair. It  seemed  evident  to  the  doctor  that  they 
jarred  upon  and  annoyed  each  other  extremely. 
On  the  whole  separating  people  appealed  to  the 
doctor's  mind  more  strongly  than  bringing  them 
together.  Accordingly  he  framed  his  enquiries 
so  as  to  make  the  revelation  of  a  latent  antipathy 
as  easy  as  possible. 

He  made  several  not  very  well-devised  begin- 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  113 

nings.  At  the  fifth  Sir  Richmond  was  suddenly- 
conclusive.  "It's  no  use,"  he  said,  "I  can't  fid- 
dle about  any  more  with  my  motives  to-day." 

An  awkward  silence  followed.  On  reflection 
Sir  Richmond  seemed  to  realize  that  this  sen- 
tence needed  some  apology.  "I  admit,"  he  said, 
"that  this  expedition  has  already  been  a  wonder- 
fully good  thing  for  me.  These  confessions  have 
made  me  look  into  all  sorts  of  things — squarely. 
But 

"I'm  not  used  to  talking  about  myself  or  even 
thinking  directly  about  myself.  What  I  say,  I 
afterwards  find  disconcerting  to  recall.  I  want 
to  alter  it.  I  can  feel  myself  wallowing  into  a  mess 
of  modifications  and  qualifications." 

"Yes,  but " 

"I  want  a  rest  anyhow.  ..." 

There  was  nothing  for  Dr.  Martineau  to  say 
to  that. 

The  two  gentlemen  smoked  for  some  time  in  a 
slightly  uncomfortable  silence.  Dr.  Martineau 
cleared  his  throat  twice  and  lit  a  second  cigar. 
They  then  agreed  to  admire  the  bridge  and  think 
well  of  Maidenhead.  Sir  Richmond  communicated 
hopeful  news  about  his  car,  which  was  to  arrive 
the  next  morning  before  ten — he'd  just  ring  the 
fellow  up  presently  to  make  sure — and  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau retired  early  and  went  rather  thoughtfully 
to  bed.  The  spate  of  Sir  Richmond's  confidences, 
it  was  evident,  was  over. 


114        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 


$4 

Sir  Richmond's  car  arrived  long  before  ten, 
brought  down  by  a  young  man  in  a  state  of  scared 
alacrity — Sir  Richmond  had  done  some  vigorous 
telephoning  before  turning  in, — the  Charmeuse 
set  off  in  a  repaired  and  chastened  condition  to 
town,  and  after  a  leisurely  breakfast  our  two  in- 
vestigators into  the  springs  of  human  conduct 
were  able  to  resume  their  westward  journey.  They 
ran  through  scattered  Twyford  with  its  pleasant- 
looking  inns  and  through  the  commonplace  urban- 
ities of  Reading,  by  Newbury  and  Hungerford's 
pretty  bridge  and  up  long  wooded  slopes  to  Saver- 
nake  forest,  where  they  found  the  road  heavy  and 
dusty,  still  in  its  war-time  state,  and  so  down  a 
steep  hill  to  the  wide  market  street  which  is 
Marlborough.  They  lunched  in  Marlborough  and 
went  on  in  the  afternoon  to  Silbury  Hill,  that 
British  pyramid,  the  largest  artificial  mound  in 
Europe.  They  left  the  car  by  the  roadside  and 
clambered  to  the  top  and  were  very  learned  and 
inconclusive  about  the  exact  purpose  of  this  vast 
heap  of  chalk  and  earth,  this  heap  that  men  had 
made  before  the  temples  at  Karnak  were  built  or 
Babylon  had  a  name 

Then  they  returned  to  the  car  and  ran  round 
by  a  winding  road  into  the  wonder  of  Avebury. 
They  found  a  clean  little  inn  there  kept  by  pleas- 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  115 

ant  people,  and  they  garaged  the  car  in  the  cow- 
shed and  took  two  rooms  for  the  night  that  they 
might  the  better  get  the  atmosphere  of  the  an- 
cient place.  Wonderful  indeed  it  is,  a  vast  cir- 
cumvallation  that  was  already  two  thousand  years 
old  before  the  dawn  of  British  history;  a  great 
wall  of  earth  with  its  ditch  most  strangely  on  its 
inner  and  not  on  its  outer  side;  and  within  this 
enclosure  gigantic  survivors  of  the  great  circles 
of  unhewn  stone  that,  even  as  late  as  Tudor  days, 
were  almost  complete.  A  whole  village,  a  church, 
a  pretty  manor  house  have  been  built,  for  the  most 
part,  out  of  the  ancient  megaliths ;  the  great  wall 
is  sufficient  to  embrace  them  all  with  their  gardens 
and  paddocks;  four  cross-roads  meet  at  the  vil- 
lage centre.  There  are  drawings  of  Avebury  be- 
fore these  things  arose  there,  when  it  was  a  lonely 
wonder  on  the  plain,  but  for  the  most  part  the 
destruction  wan  already  done  before  the  Mayflower 
sailed.  To  the  southward  stands  the  cone  of  Sil- 
bury  Hill ;  its  shadow  creeps  up  and  down  the  in- 
tervening meadows  as  the  scions  change.  Around 
this  lonely  place  rise  the  Downs,  now  bare  sheep 
pastures,  in  broad  undulations,  with  a  wart-like 
barrow  here  and  there,  and  from  it  radiate,  creep* 
ing  up  to  gain  and  liold  the  crests  of  the  hills, 
the  abandoned  trackways  of  that  forgotten  world. 
These  trackways,  these  green  roads  of  England, 
these  roads  already  disused  when  the  Romans 
made  their  highway  past  Silbury  Hill  to  Bath, 


116         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

can  still  be  traced  for  scores  of  miles  through  the 
land,  running  to  Salisbury  and  the  English  Chan- 
nel, eastward  to  the  crossing  at  the  Straits  and 
westward  to  Wales,  to  ferries  over  the  Severn, 
and  southwestward  into  Devon  and  Cornwall. 

The  doctor  and  Sir  Richmond  walked  round  the 
walls,  surveyed  the  shadow  cast  by  Silbury  upon 
the  river  flats,  strolled  up  the  down  to  the  north- 
ward to  get  a  general  view  of  the  village,  had  tea 
and  smoked  round  the  walls  again  in  the  warm 
April  sunset.  The  matter  of  their  conversation 
remained  prehistoric.  Both  were  inclined  to  find 
fault  with  the  archaeological  work  that  had  been 
done  on  the  place.  " Clumsy  treasure  hunting," 
Sir  Richmond  said.  l *  They  bore  into  Silbury  Hill 
and  expect  to  find  a  mummified  chief  or  something 
sensational  of  that  sort,  and  they  don't,  and  they 
report — nothing.  They  haven't  sifted  finely 
enough;  they  haven't  thought  subtly  enough. 
These  walls  of  earth  ought  to  tell  what  these  peo- 
ple ate,  what  clothes  they  wore,  what  woods  they 
used.  Was  this  a  sheep  land  then  as  it  is  now, 
or  a  cattle  land?  Were  these  hills  covered  by  for- 
ests? I  don't  know.  These  archaeologists  don't 
know.  Or  if  they  do  they  haven't  told  me, — 
which  is  just  as  bad.    I  don't  believe  they  know. 

"What  trade  came  here  along  these  tracks'?  So 
far  as  I  know,  they  had  no  beasts  of  burthen.  But 
suppose  one  day  someone  were  to  find  a  potsherd 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  117 

here  from  early  Knossos,  or  a  fragment  of  glass 
from  Pepi's  Egypt." 

The  place  had  stirred  up  his  imagination.  He 
wrestled  with  his  ignorance  as  if  he  thought  that 
by  talking  he  might  presently  worry  out  some  pic- 
ture of  this  forgotten  world,  without  metals,  with- 
out beasts  of  burthen,  without  letters,  without  any 
sculpture  that  has  left  a  trace,  and  yet  with  a 
sense  of  astronomical  fact  clear  enough  to  raise 
the  great  gnomon  of  Silbury,  and  with  a  social 
system  complex  enough  to  give  the  large  and  or- 
derly community  to  which  the  size  of  Avebury 
witnesses  and  the  traffic  to  which  the  green  roads 
testify. 

The  doctor  had  not  realized  before  the  boldness 
and  liveliness  of  his  companion's  mind.  Sir  Rich- 
mond insisted  that  the  climate  must  have  been 
moister  and  milder  in  those  days;  he  covered  all 
the  downlands  with  woods,  as  Savernake  was  still 
covered;  beneath  the  trees  he  restored  a  thicker, 
richer  soil.  These  people  must  have  done  an 
enormous  lot  with  wood.  This  use  of  stones  here 
was  a  freak.  It  was  1  lie;  very  strangeness  of  stones 
here  that  had  made  them  into  sacred  things.  One 
thought  too  much  of  the  stones  of  the  Stone  Age. 
Who  would  carve  these  Jumps  of  quartzite  when 
one  could  carve  good  oak  ?  Or  beech — a  most  carv- 
able  wood.  Especially  when  one's  sharpest  chisel 
was  a  flint.     "It's  wood  wo  ought  to  look  for," 


118        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

said  Sir  Richmond.  "Wood  and  fibre."  He  de- 
clared that  these  people  had  their  tools  of  wood, 
their  homes  of  wood,  their  gods  and  perhaps  their 
records  of  wood.  "A  peat  bog  here,  even  a  few 
feet  of  clay,  might  have  pickled  some  precious 
memoranda.  ...  No  such  luck.  ..."  Now  in 
Glastonbury  marshes  one  found  the  life  of  the 
early  iron  age — half  way  to  our  own  times — quite 
beautifully  pickled. 

Though  they  wrestled  mightily  with  the  prob- 
lem, neither  Sir  Richmond  nor  the  doctor  could 
throw  a  gleam  of  light  upon  the  riddle  why  the 
ditch  was  inside  and  not  outside  the  great  wall. 

"And  what  was  our  Mind  like  in  those  days?" 
said  Sir  Richmond.  ' '  That,  I  suppose,  is  what  in- 
terests you.  A  vivid  childish  mind,  I  guess,  with 
not  a  suspicion  as  yet  that  it  was  Man  ruling  his 
Planet  or  anything  of  that  sort." 

The  doctor  pursed  his  lips.  "None,"  he  de- 
livered judicially.  "If  one  were  able  to  recall 
one's  childhood — at  the  age  of  about  twelve  or 
thirteen — when  the  artistic  impulse  so  often  goes 
into  abeyance  and  one  begins  to  think  in  a  trou- 
bled, monstrous  way  about  God  and  Hell,  one 
might  get  something  like  the  mind  of  this  place." 

"Thirteen.  You  put  them  at  that— already? 
.  .  .    These  people,  you  think,  were  religious?" 

"Intensely.  In  that  personal  way  that  gives 
death  a  nightmare  terror.  And  as  for  the  fading 
of  the  artistic  impulse,  they  've  left  not  a  trace  of 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  119 

the  paintings  and  drawings  and  scratehings  of  the 
Old  Stone  people  who  came  before  them. ' ' 

"  Adults  with  the  minds  of  thirteen-year-old 
children.  Thirteen-year-old  children  with  the 
strength  of  adults — and  no  one  to  slap  them  or  tell 
them  not  to.  .  .  .  After  all,  they  probably  only 
thought  of  death  now  and  then.  And  they  never 
thought  of  fuel.  They  supposed  there  was  no  end 
to  that.  So  they  used  up  their  woods  and  kept 
goats  to  nibble  and  kill  the  new  undergrowth.  .  .  . 
Did  these  people  have  goats?" 

"I  don't  know,"  said  the  doctor.  "So  little  is 
known. ' ' 

"Very  like  children  they  must  have  been.  The 
same  unending  days.  They  must  have  thought 
that  the  world  went  on  for  ever — just  as  they 
knew  it — like  my  damned  Committee  does.  .  .  . 
With  their  fuel  wasting  away  and  the  climate 
changing  imperceptibly,  century  by  century.  .  .  . 
Kings  and  important  men  followed  one  another 
here  for  centuries  and  centuries.  .  .  .  They  had 
lost  their  past  and  had  no  Idea  of  any  future.  .  .  . 
They  bad  forgotten  liow  they  came  into  the  land 
.  .  .  When  I  was  a  child  I  believed  that  my 
father's  garden  had  been  there  forever.  .  .  . 

"This   is  very    Like   Irving   lo    remember   some 

game  one  played  when  one  was  a  child,     li   is 

like  coming  on  something  thai  one  built  up  with 
bricks  and  Stones  in  some  forgotten  pari  of  the 
garden.  ..." 


120        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"The  life  we  lived  here,"  said  the  doctor,  "has 
left  its  traces  in  traditions,  in  mental  predisposi- 
tions, in  still  nnanalyzed  fundamental  ideas." 

"Archaeology  is  very  like  remembering,"  said 
Sir  Richmond.  "Presently  we  shall  remember  a 
lot  more  about  all  this.  We  shall  remember  what 
it  was  like  to  live  in  this  place,  and  the  long  jour- 
ney hither,  age  by  age  out  of  the  south.  We  shall 
remember  the  sacrifices  we  made  and  the  crazy 
reasons  why  we  made  them.  We  sowed  our  corn 
in  blood  here.  We  had  strange  fancies  about  the 
stars.  Those  we  brought  with  us  out  of  the  south 
where  the  stars  are  brighter.  And  what  like  were 
those  wooden  gods  of  ours?  I  don't  remember. 
.  .  .  But  I  could  easily  persuade  myself  that  I 
had  been  here  before." 

They  stood  on  the  crest  of  the  ancient  wall  and 
the  setting  sun  cast  long  shadows  of  them  athwart 
a  field  of  springing  wheat. 

"Perhaps  we  shall  come  here  again,"  the  doc- 
tor carried  on  Sir  Richmond's  fancy;  "after  an- 
other four  thousand  years  or  so,  with  different 
names  and  fuller  minds.  And  then  I  suppose  that 
this  ditch  won't  be  the  riddle  it  is  now." 

"Life  didn't  seem  so  complicated  then,"  Sir 
Richmond  mused.  "Our  muddles  were  uncon- 
scious. We  drifted  from  mood  to  mood  and  for- 
got. There  was  more  sunshine  then,  more  laugh- 
ter perhaps,  and  blacker  despair.  Despair  like  the 
despair  of  children  that  can  weep  itself  to  sleep. 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  121 

...  It's  over.  .  .  .  Was  it  battle  and  massacre 
that  ended  that  long  afternoon  here?  Or  did  the 
woods  catch  fire  some  exceptionally  dry  summer, 
leaving  black  hills  and  famine!  Or  did  strange 
men  bring  a  sickness — measles,  perhaps,  or  the 
black  death?  Or  was  it  cattle  pest?  Or  did  we 
just  waste  our  woods  and  dwindle  away  before 
the  new  peoples  that  came  into  the  land  across 
the  southern  sea?    I  can't  remember.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond  turned  about.  "I  would  like  to 
dig  up  the  bottom  of  this  ditch  here  foot  by  foot — 
and  dry  the  stuff  and  sift  it — very  carefully.  .  .  . 
Then  I  might  begin  to  remember  things." 


$5 

In  the  evening,  after  a  pleasant  supper,  they 
took  a  turn  about  the  walls  with  the  moon  sinking 
over  beyond  Silbury,  and  then  wont  in  and  sat 
by  lamplight  before  a  brightly  fussy  wood  fire  and 
smoked.  There  were  long  intervals  of  friendly 
silence. 

"I  don't  in  the  least  want  to  go  on  talking  about 
myself,"  said  Sir  Richmond  abruptly. 

"Lei  ii  rest  then,"  said  the  doctor  generously. 

"To-day,  among  these  ancient  memories,  has 
taken  me  out  of  myself  wonderfully.  I  can't  tell 
you  how  good  Avebnry  lias  beeD  for  me.  This 
afternoon  half  my  consciousness  has  seemed  to 


122        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

be  a  tattooed  creature  wearing  a  knife  of 
stone.  ..." 

"The  healing  touch  of  history." 

"And  for  the  first  time  my  damned  Committee 
has  mattered  scarcely  a  rap." 

Sir  Eichmond  stretched  himself  in  his  chair  and 
blinked  cheerfully  at  his  cigar  smoke. 

"Nevertheless,"  he  said,  "this  confessional 
business  of  yours  has  been  an  excellent  exercise. 
It  has  enabled  me  to  get  outside  myself,  to  look  at 
myself  as  a  Case.  Now  I  can  even  see  myself  as  a 
remote  Case.  That  I  needn't  bother  about  fur- 
ther. ...  So  far  as  that  goes,  I  think  we  have 
done  all  that  there  is  to  be  done." 

"I  shouldn't  say  that — quite — yet,"  said  the 
doctor. 

"I  don't  think  I'm  a  subject  for  real  psycho- 
analysis at  all.  I'm  not  an  overlaid  sort  of  per- 
son. When  I  spread  myself  out  there  is  not  much 
indication  of  a  suppressed  wish  or  of  anything 
masked  or  buried  of  that  sort.  What  you  get  is 
a  quite  open  and  recognized  discord  of  two  sets 
of  motives." 

The  doctor  considered.  "Yes,  I  think  that  is 
true.  Your  libido  is,  I  should  say,  exceptionally 
free.  Generally  you  are  doing  what  you  want  to 
do — overdoing,  in  fact,  what  you  want  to  do — 
and  getting  simply  tired." 

"Which  is  the  theory  I  started  with.  I  am  a 
case   of   fatigue   under  irritating  circumstances 


LAND  OF  THE  FORGOTTEN  PEOPLES  123 

with  very  little  mental  complication  or  conceal- 
ment." 

"Yes,"  said  the  doctor.  "I  agree.  You  are 
not  a  case  for  psychoanalysis,  strictly  speaking, 
at  all.  You  are  in  open  conflict  with  yourself 
upon  moral  and  social  issues.  Practically  open. 
Your  problems  are  problems  of  conscious  con- 
duct." 

"As  I  said." 

"Of  what  renunciations  you  have  consciously 
to  make." 

Sir  Richmond  did  not  answer  that.  .  .  . 

"This  pilgrimage  of  ours,"  he  said,  presently, 
"has  made  for  magnanimity.  This  day  particu- 
larly has  been  a  good  day.  When  we  stood  on  this 
old  wall  here  in  the  sunset  I  seemed  to  be  standing 
outside  myself  in  an  immense  still  sphere  of  past 
and  future.  I  stood  with  my  feet  upon  the  Stone 
Age  and  saw  myself  four  thousand  years  away, 
and  all  my  distresses  as  very  little  incidents  in 
that  perspective.  Away  there  in  London  the  case 
is  altogether  different;  after  three  hours  or  so 
of  the  Committee  one  concentrates  into  one  little 
inflamed  moment  of  personality.  There  is  no  past 
any  longer,  there  is  no  future,  there  is  only  the 
rankling  dispute.  For  all  those  three  horns,  per- 
haps, I  have  been  thinking  of  just  what  I  had  to 
say,  just  how  I  had  to  say  it,  just  how  I  looked 
while  I  said  it,  just  how  much  I  was  making  my- 
self understood,  how  I  might  be  misunderstood, 


124        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

how  I  might  be  misrepresented,  challenged,  de- 
nied. One  draws  in  more  and  more  as  one  is 
used  up.  At  last  one  is  reduced  to  a  little,  raw, 
bleeding,  desperately  fighting,  pin-point  of  self. 
.  .  .  One  goes  back  to  one's  home  unable  to  re- 
cover. Fighting  it  over  again.  All  night  some- 
times. ...  I  get  up  and  walk  about  the  room  and 
curse.  .  .  .  Martineau,  how  is  one  to  get  the  Ave- 
bury  frame  of  mind  to  Westminster?" 

4 'When  Westminster  is  as  dead  as  Avebury," 
said  the  doctor,  unhelpfully.  He  added  after  some 
seconds,  " Milton  knew  of  these  troubles.  'Not 
without  dust  and  heat,'  he  wrote — a  great 
phrase." 

"But  the  dust  chokes  me,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

He  took  up  a  copy  of  The  Green  Roads  of  En- 
gland that  lay  beside  him  on  the  table.  But  he  did 
not  open  it.  He  held  it  in  his  hand  and  said  the 
thing  he  had  had  in  mind  to  say  all  that  evening. 
1 '  I  do  not  think  that  I  shall  stir  up  my  motives  any 
more  for  a  time.  Better  to  go  on  into  the  west 
country  cooling  my  poor  old  brain  in  these  wide 
shadows  of  the  past." 

"I  can  prescribe  nothing  better,"  said  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau. "Incidentally,  we  may  be  able  to  throw 
a  little  more  light  on  one  or  two  of  your  minor 
entanglements." 

"I  don't  want  to  think  of  them,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond. "Let  me  get  right  away  from  everything. 
Until  my  skin  has  grown  again. ' ' 


CHAPTER  THE  SIXTH 

THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE 
§1 

Next  day  in  the  early  afternoon  after  a  farewell 
walk  over  the  downs  round  Avebury  they  went 
by  way  of  Devizes  and  Netheravon  and  Amesbury 
to  Stonehenge. 

Dr.  Martineau  had  seen  this  ancient  monument 
before,  but  now,  with  Avebury  fresh  in  his  mind, 
he  found  it  a  poorer  thing  than  he  had  remem- 
bered it  to  be.  Sir  Richmond  was  frankly  disap- 
pointed. After  the  real  greatness  and  mystery 
of  the  older  place,  it  seemed  a  poor  little  heap  of 
stones ;  it  did  not  even  dominate  the  landscape ;  it 
was  some  way  from  the  crest  of  the  swelling  down 
on  which  it  stood  and  it  was  further  dwarfed  by 
the  colossal  air-ship  hangars  and  clustering  of- 
fices of  the  air  station  thai  the  great  war  had  called 
into  existence  upon  the  slopes  to  the  south-west. 
"It  looks,"  Sir  Richmond  said,  "as  though  some 
old  giantess  had  left  a  discarded  set  of  teeth  on 
the  hillside/'  Far  more  Impressive  than  Stone- 
henge  itself  were  the  barrows  that  capped  the 
neighbouring  crests. 

125 


126         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

The  sacred  stones  were  fenced  about,  and  our 
visitors  had  to  pay  for  admission  at  a  little  kiosk 
by  the  gate.  At  the  side  of  the  road  stood  a  travel- 
stained  middle-class  automobile,  with  a  miscel- 
lany of  dusty  luggage,  rugs  and  luncheon  things 
therein — a  family  automobile  with  father  no 
doubt  at  the  wheel.  Sir  Richmond  left  his  own 
trim  coupe  at  its  tail. 

They  were  impeded  at  the  entrance  by  a  differ- 
ence of  opinion  between  the  keeper  of  the  turn- 
stile and  a  small  but  resolute  boy  of  perhaps  five 
or  six  who  proposed  to  leave  the  enclosure.  The 
custodian  thought  that  it  would  be  better  if  his 
nurse  or  his  mother  came  out  with  him. 

''She  keeps  on  looking  at  it,"  said  the  small  boy. 
"It  isunt  anything.  I  want  to  go  and  clean  the 
car. ' ' 

"You  won't  see  Stonehenge  every  day,  young 
man, ' '  said  the  custodian,  a  little  piqued. 

"It's  only  an  old  beach,"  said  the  small  boy, 
with  extreme  conviction.  "It's  rocks  like  the  sea- 
side.   And  there  isunt  no  sea." 

The  man  at  the  turnstile  mutely  consulted  the 
doctor. 

"I  don't  see  that  he  can  get  into  any  harm 
here,"  the  doctor  advised,  and  the  small  boy  was 
released  from  archaeology. 

He  strolled  to  the  family  automobile,  produced 
an  en-tout-cas  pocket-handkerchief  and  set  himself 
to  polish  the  lamps  with  great  assiduity.    The  two 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      127 

gentlemen  lingered  at  the  turnstile  for  a  moment 
or  so  to  watch  his  proceedings.  ' '  Modern  child, ' ' 
said  Sir  Richmond.  "Old  stones  are  just  old 
stones  to  him.    But  motor  cars  are  gods." 

"You  can  hardly  expect  him  to  understand — 
at  his  age,"  said  the  custodian,  jealous  for  the 
honor  of  Stonehenge.  .  .  . 

"Reminds  me  of  Martir's  little  girl,"  said  Sir 
Richmond,  as  he  and  Dr.  Martineau  went  on 
towards  the  circle.  "When  she  encountered  her 
first  dragon-fly  she  was  greatly  delighted.  'Oh, 
dee'  lill'  a'eplane,'  she  said." 

As  they  approached  the  grey  old  stones  they  be- 
came aware  of  a  certain  agitation  among  them.  A 
voice,  an  authoritative  bass  voice,  was  audible,  cry- 
ing, ' '  Anthony ! "  A  nurse  appeared  remotely  go- 
ing in  the  direction  of  the  aeroplane  sheds,  and 
her  cry  of  "Master  Anthony"  came  faintly  on  the 
breeze.  An  extremely  pretty  young  woman  of  five 
or  six  and  twenty  became  visible  standing  on  one 
of  the  great  prostrate  stones  in  the  centre  of  the 
place.  She  was  a  black-haired,  sun-burnt  individ- 
ual and  she  stood  with  her  arms  akimbo,  quite 
frankly  amused  al  the  disappearance  of  Master 
Anthony,  and  offering  no  sort  of  help  for  his  re- 
covery. On  the  greensward  before  Iter  stood  the 
paterfamilias  of  the  family  automobile,  and  he 

was  making  a  trumpel  with  his  hands  in  order  to 
repeat  the  name  of  Anthony  with  greater  effect. 
A  short  lady  in  grey  emerged  from  among  the  en- 


128         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

circling  megaliths,  and  one  or  two  other  feminine 
personalities  produced  effects  of  movement  rather 
than  of  individuality  as  they  flitted  among  the 
stones.  "Well,"  said  the  lady  in  grey,  with  that 
rising  intonation  of  humorous  conclusion  which 
is  so  distinctively  American,  "those  Druids  have 
got  him." 

' '  He 's  hiding, ' '  said  the  automobilist,  in  a  voice 
that  promised  chastisement  to  a  hidden  hearer. 
"That's  what  he's  doing.  He  ought  not  to  play 
tricks  like  this.    A  great  boy  who  is  almost  six. ' ' 

"If  you  are  looking  for  a  small,  resolute  boy 
of  six,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  addressing  himself  to 
the  lady  on  the  rock  rather  than  to  the  angry  par- 
ent below,  "he's  perfectly  safe  and  happy.  The 
Druids  haven't  got  him.  Indeed,  they've  failed 
altogether  to  get  him.  '  Stonehenge, '  he  says,  4s 
no  good.'  So  he's  gone  back  to  clean  the  lamps 
of  your  car." 

"Aa-oo.  So  that's  it!"  said  Papa.  "Winnie, 
go  and  tell  Price  he's  gone  back  to  the  car.  .  .  . 
They  oughtn't  to  have  let  him  out  of  the  en- 
closure. .  .  . 

The  excitement  about  Master  Anthony  col- 
lapsed. The  rest  of  the  people  in  the  circles  crys- 
tallized out  into  the  central  space  as  two  appar- 
ent sisters  and  an  apparent  aunt  and  the  nurse, 
who  was  packed  off  at  once  to  supervise  the  lamp 
cleaning.    The  head  of  the  family  found  some  dim- 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE     129 

culty,  it  would  seem,  in  readjusting  his  mind  to 
the  comparative  innocence  of  Anthony,  and  Sir 
Richmond  and  the  young  lady  on  the  rock  sought 
as  if  by  common  impulse  to  establish  a  general 
conversation.  There  were  faint  traces  of  excite- 
ment in  her  manner,  as  though  there  had  been 
some  controversial  passage  between  herself  and 
the  family  gentleman. 

"We  were  discussing  the  age  of  this  old  place," 
she  said,  smiling  in  the  frankest  and  friendliest 
way.    "How  old  do  you  think  it  is?" 

The  father  of  Anthony  intervened,  also  with  a 
shadow  of  controversy  in  his  manner.  "I  was 
explaining  to  the  young  lady  that  it  dates  from  the 
early  bronze  age.  Before  chronology  existed.  .  .  . 
But  she  insists  on  dates." 

"Nothing  of  bronze  has  ever  been  found  here," 
said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Well,  when  was  this  early  bronze  age,  any- 
how?" said  the  young  lady. 

Sir  Richmond  sought  a  recognizable  datum. 
"Bronze  got  to  Britain  somewhere  between  the 
times  of  Moses  ;iik1  Solomon." 

"Ah!"  said  the  young  lady,  as  who  should  say, 
'This  man  at  leasl  talks  sense.' 

"But  these  stones  are  all  shaped,"  said  the 
father 'of  the  family.  "It  is  difficult  to  see  how 
that  could  have  been  done  without  something 
harder  than  stone." 


130         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"I  don't  see  the  place,"  said  the  young  lady  on 
the  stone.  "I  can't  imagine  how  they  did  it  up — 
not  one  bit." 

"Did  it  up!"  exclaimed  the  father  of  the  fam- 
ily in  the  tone  of  one  accustomed  to  find  a  gentle 
sport  in  the  intellectual  frailties  of  his  women- 
kind. 

"It's  just  the  bones  of  a  place.  They  hung 
things  round  it.    They  draped  it." 

"But  what  things?"  asked  Sir  Richmond. 

*  *  Oh !  they  had  things  all  right.  Skins  perhaps. 
Mats  of  rushes.  Bast  cloth.  "Fibre  of  all  sorts. 
Wadded  stuff." 

"Stonehenge  draped!  It's  really  a  delightful 
idea;"  said  the  father  of  the  family,  enjoying  it. 

"It's  quite  a  possible  one,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Or  they  may  have  used  wicker,"  the  young 
lady  went  on,  undismayed.  She  seemed  to  con- 
cede a  point.    ' '  Wicker  is  likelier. ' ' 

"But  surely,"  said  the  father  of  the  family, 
with  the  expostulatory  voice  and  gesture  of  one 
who  would  recall  erring  wits  to  sanity,  "it  is  far 
more  impressive  standing  out  bare  and  noble  as 
it  does.    In  lonely  splendour." 

"But  all  this  country  may  have  been  wooded 
then,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "In  which  case  it 
wouldn't  have  stood  out.  It  doesn't  stand  out  so 
very  much  even  now." 

"You  came  to  it  through  a  grove,"  said  the 
young  lady,  eagerly  picking  up  the  idea. 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      131 

"Probably  beech,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Which  may  have  pointed  to  the  midsummer 
sunrise,"  said  Dr.  Martineau,  unheeded. 

"These  are  novel  ideas,"  said  the  father  of  the 
family  in  the  reproving  tone  of  one  who  never 
allows  a  novel  idea  inside  his  doors  if  he  can  pre- 
vent it. 

"Well,"  said  the  young  lady,  "I  guess  there 
was  some  sort  of  show  here  anyhow.  And  no  hu- 
man being  ever  had  a  show  yet  without  trying  to 
shut  people  out  of  it  in  order  to  make  them  come 
in.  I  guess  this  was  covered  in  all  right.  A  dark 
hunched  old  place  in  a  wood.  Beech  stems,  smooth, 
like  pillars.  And  they  came  to  it  at  night,  in 
procession,  beating  drums,  and  scared  half  out 
of  their  wits.  They  came  in  there  and  went  round 
the  inner  circle  with  their  torches.  And  so  they 
were  shown.  The  torches  were  put  out  and  the 
priests  did  their  mysteries.  Until  dawn  broke. 
That's  how  they  worked  it." 

"But  even  you  can't  tell  what  the  show  was, 
V.V."  said  the  lady  in  grey,  who  was  standing  now 
at  Dr.  Martineau \s  elbow. 

"Something  horrid,"  said  Anthony's  younger 
sister  to  her  elder  in  a  si  age  whisper. 

" Blurjr/jj,"  agreed  Anthony's  elder  sister  to  the 
younger,  in  a  noiseless  voice  that  certainly  did 
not  reach  father.     "Squeals!  ..." 

This  young  lady  who  was  addressed  ;is  "V.V." 
was  perhaps  one  or  two  and  twenty,   Dr.   Mar- 


132         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

tineau  thought, — he  was  not  very  good  at  feminine 
ages.  She  had  a  clear  sun-browned  complex- 
ion, with  dark  hair  and  smiling  lips.  Her  fea- 
tures were  finely  modelled,  with  just  that  added 
touch  of  breadth  in  the  brow  and  softness  in  the 
cheek  bones,  that  faint  flavour  of  the  Amerindian, 
one  sees  at  times  in  American  women.  Her  voice 
was  a  very  soft  and  pleasing  voice,  and  she  spoke 
persuasively  and  not  assertively  as  so  many  Amer- 
ican women  do.  Her  determination  to  make  the 
dry  bones  of  Stonehenge  live  shamed  the  doc- 
tor's disappointment  with  the  place.  And  when 
she  had  spoken,  Dr.  Martineau  noted  that  she 
looked  at  Sir  Richmond  as  if  she  expected  him  at 
least  to  confirm  her  vision.  Sir  Richmond  was 
evidently  prepared  to  confirm  it. 

With  a  queer  little  twinge  of  infringed  pro- 
prietorship, the  doctor  saw  Sir  Richmond  step  up 
on  the  prostrate  megalith  and  stand  beside  her, 
the  better  to  appreciate  her  point  of  view.  He 
smiled  down  at  her.  "Now  why  do  you  think 
they  came  in  there?"  he  asked. 

The  young  lady  was  not  very  clear  about  her 
directions.  She  did  not  know  of  the  roadway 
running  to  the  Avon  river,  nor  of  the  alleged  race 
course  to  the  north,  nor  had  she  ever  heard  that 
the  stones  were  supposed  to  be  of  two  different 
periods  and  that  some  of  them  might  possibly 
have  been  brought  from  a  very  great  distance. 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      133 

§2 

Neither  Dr.  Martineau  nor  the  father  of  the 
family  found  the  imaginative  reconstruction  of 
the  Stonehenge  rituals  quite  so  exciting  as  the  two 
principals.  The  father  of  the  family  endured 
some  further  particulars  with  manifest  impa- 
tience, no  longer  able,  now  that  Sir  Richmond  was 
encouraging  the  girl,  to  keep  her  in  check  with 
the  slightly  derisive  smile  proper  to  her  sex.  Then 
he  proclaimed  in  a  fine  loud  tenor,  "All  this  is 
very  imaginative,  I'm  afraid."  And  to  his  fam- 
ily, "Time  we  were  pressing  on.  Turps,  we  must 
go-o.     Come,  Phoebe!" 

As  he  led  his  little  flock  towards  the  exit  his 
voice  came  floating  back.  "Talking  wanton  non- 
sense. .  .  .  Any  professional  archaeologist  would 
laugh,  simply  laugh.  ..." 

He  passed  out  of  the  world. 

With  a  t'jiiiil  intimation  of  dismay  Dr.  Marti- 
neau realized  I  fial  the  1  wo  talkative  ladies  were  not 
to  be  removed  in  the  family  automobile  with  the 
rest  of  the  party.  Sir  Richmond  and  the  younger 
lady  wenl  on  very  cheerfully  to  the  population, 
agriculture,  housing  and  general  scenery  of  the 
surrounding  Downland  during  the  later  Stone 
Age.  The  shorler,  less  attractive  lady,  whose  ac- 
cent was  distinctly  American,  came  now  and  stood 
at  the  doctor's  elbow.  She  seemed  moved  to  play 
the  part  of  chorus  to  the  two  upon  the  Btone. 


134        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"When  V.V.  gets  going,"  she  remarked,  "she 
makes  things  come  alive." 

Dr.  Martineau  hated  to  be  addressed  suddenly 
by  strange  ladies.  He  started,  and  his  face  as- 
sumed the  distressed  politeness  of  the  moon  at 
its  full.  "Your  friend,"  he  said,  "interested  in 
archaeology  ? ' ' 

"Interested!"  said  the  stouter  lady.  "Why I 
She's  a  fiend  at  it.  Ever  since  we  came  on 
Carnac. ' ' 

"You've  visited  Carnac1?" 

"That's  where  the  bug  bit  her,"  said  the  stout 
lady  with  a  note  of  querulous  humour.  ' '  Directly 
V.V.  set  eyes  on  Carnac,  she  just  turned  against 
all  her  up-bringing.  'Why  wasn't  I  told  of  this 
before?'  she  said.  'What's  Notre  Dame  to  this? 
This  is  where  we  came  from.  This  is  the  real 
starting  point  of  the  Mayflower.  Belinda,'  she 
said,  'we've  got  to  see  all  we  can  of  this  sort 
of  thing  before  we  go  back  to  America.  They've 
been  keeping  this  from  us. '  And  that 's  why  we  're 
here  right  now  instead  of  being  shopping  in  Paris 
or  London  like  decent  American  women." 

The  younger  lady  looked  down  on  her  companion 
with  something  of  the  calm  expert  attention 'that 
a  plumber  gives  to  a  tap  that  is  misbehaving,  and 
like  a  plumber  refrained  from  precipitate  action. 
She  stood  with  the  backs  of  her  hands  resting 
on  her  hips. 

"Well,"  she  said  slowly,  giving  most  of  the  re- 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      135 

mark  to  Sir  Richmond  and  the  re'st  to  the  doctor. 
"It  is  nearer  the  beginnings  of  things  than  Lon- 
don or  Paris." 

"And  nearer  to  us,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  call  that — just  paradoxical,"  said  the 
shorter  lady,  who  appeared  to  be  called  Belinda. 

' '  Not  paradoxical, ' '  Dr.  Martineau  contradicted 
gently.  "Life  is  always  beginning  again.  And 
this  is  a  time  of  fresh  beginnings." 

"Now  that's  after  V.V.'s  own  heart,"  cried  the 
stout  lady  in  grey.  "She'll  agree  to  all  that. 
She's  been  saying  it  right  across  Europe.  Rome, 
Paris,  London;  they're  simply  just  done.  They 
don't  signify  any  more.  They've  got  to  be 
cleared  away." 

"You  let  me  tell  my  own  opinions,  Belinda," 
said  the  young  lady  who  was  called  V.V.  "I  said 
that  if  people  went  on  building  with  fluted  pillars 
and  Corinthian  capitals  for  two  thousand  years,  it 
was  time  they  were  cleared  up  and  taken  away." 

"Corinthian  capitals?"  Sir  Richmond  consid- 
ered it  and  laughed  cheerfully.  "I  suppose 
Europe  does  rather  overdo  that  sort  of  thing." 

"The  way  she  went  on  about  the  Victor  Em 
mannele  Monomenl !"  said  the  lady  who  answered 
to  the  name  of  Belinda.    "It  gave  me  cold  shivers 
to  think   that  those    Italian  officers  might    under- 
stand English." 

The  lady  who  was  called  V.V.  smiled  as  if  she 
smiled   at  herself,  and   explained   herself   to  Sir 


136         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Richmond.  "When  one  is  travelling  about,  one 
gets  to  think  of  history  and  politics  in  terms  of 
architecture.  I  do  anyhow.  And  those  columns 
with  Corinthian  capitals  have  got  to  be  a  sort  of 
symbol  for  me  for  everything  in  Europe  that  I 
don't  want  and  have  no  sort  of  use  for.  It  isn't 
a  bad  sort  of  capital  in  its  way,  florid  and  pretty, 
but  not  a  patch  on  the  Doric; — and  that  a  whole 
continent  should  come  up  to  it  and  stick  at  it  and 
never  get  past  it!  .  .  ." 

"It's  the  classical  tradition." 

"It  puzzles  me." 

"It's  the  Roman  Empire.  That  Corinthian 
column  is  a  weed  spread  by  the  Romans  all  over 
western  Europe." 

"And  it  smothers  the  history  of  Europe.  You 
can't  see  Europe  because  of  it.  Europe  is  ob- 
sessed by  Rome.  Everywhere  Marble  Arches  and 
Arcs  de  Triomphe.  You  never  get  away  from  it. 
It  is  like  some  old  gentleman  who  has  lost  his  way 
in  a  speech  and  keeps  on  repeating  the  same  thing. 
And  can't  sit  down.  'The  empire,  gentlemen — 
Empire.  Empire.'  Rome  itself  is  perfectly 
frightful.  It  stares  at  you  with  its  great  round 
stupid  arches  as  though  it  couldn't  imagine  that 
you  could  possibly  want  anything  else  for  ever. 
Saint  Peter's  and  that  frightful  Monument  are 
just  the  same  stuff  as  the  Baths  of  Caracalla  and 
the  palaces  of  the  Caesars.    Just  the  same.    They 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      137 

will  make  just  the  same  sort  of  ruins.  It  goes  on 
and  goes  on." 

"Ave  Roma  Immortalis,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 

"This  Roman  empire  seems  to  be  Europe's  first 
and  last  idea.  A  fixed  idea.  And  such  a  poor 
idea!  .  .  .  America  never  came  out  of  that.  It's 
no  good  telling  me  that  it  did.  It  escaped  from 
it.  .  .  .  So  I  said  to  Belinda  here,  *  Let's  burrow, 
if  we  can,  under  all  this  marble  and  find  out  what 
sort  of  people  we  were  before  this  Roman  empire 
and  its  acanthus  weeds  got  hold  of  us.'  " 

"I  seem  to  remember  at  Washington,  something 
faintly  Corinthian,  something  called  the  Capitol," 
Sir  Richmond  reflected.  "And  other  buildings. 
A  Treasury." 

"That's  different,"  said  the  young  lady,  so  con- 
clusively that  it  seemed  to  leave  nothing  more  to 
be  said  on  that  score. 

"A  last  twinge  of  Europeanism,"  she  vouch- 
safed.   "We  were  young  in  those  days." 

"You  are  well  beneath  the  marble  here." 

She  assented  cheerfully. 

"A  thousand  years  before  it." 

"  Happy  place !    Happy  people!1' 

"But  even  this  place  isn't  the  beginning  of 
things  here.  Carnac  was  older  than  Ihis.  And 
older  still  is  Avebury.  Nave  yon  heard  in  Amer- 
ica of  Avebnryl  It  may  have  predated  this 
place,  they  think,  by  another  thousand  years." 


138         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"Avebury?"  said  the  lady  who  was  called 
Belinda. 

"But  what  is  this  Avebury?' '  asked  V.V.  "I've 
never  heard  of  the  place." 

"I  thought  it  was  a  lord,"  said  Belinda. 

Sir  Richmond,  with  occasional  appeals  to  Dr. 
Martineau,  embarked  upon  an  account  of  the 
glory  and  wonder  of  Avebury.  Possibly  he  exag- 
gerated Avebury.  .  .  . 

It  was  Dr.  Martineau  who  presently  brought 
this  disquisition  upon  Avebury  to  a  stop  by  a 
very  remarkable  gesture.  He  looked  at  his 
watch.  He  drew  it  out  ostentatiously,  a  thick,  re- 
spectable gold  watch,  for  the  doctor  was  not  the 
sort  of  man  to  wear  his  watch  upon  his  wrist.  He 
clicked  it  open  and  looked  at  it.  Thereby  he 
would  have  proclaimed  his  belief  this  encounter 
was  an  entirely  unnecessary  interruption  of  his 
healing  duologue  with  Sir  Richmond,  which  must 
now  be  resumed. 

But  this  action  had  scarcely  the  effect  he  had 
intended  it  to  have.  It  set  the  young  lady  who 
was  called  Belinda  asking  about  ways  and  means 
of  getting  to  Salisbury;  it  brought  to  light  the 
distressing  fact  that  V.V.  had  the  beginnings  of 
a  chafed  heel.  Once  he  had  set  things  going  they 
moved  much  too  quickly  for  the  doctor  to  deflect 
their  course.  He  found  himself  called  upon  to 
make  personal  sacrifices  to  facilitate  the  painless 
transport  of  the  two  ladies  to  Salisbury,  where 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      139 

their  luggage  awaited  them  at  the  Old  George 
Hotel.  In  some  way  too  elusive  to  trace,  it  be- 
came evident  that  he  and  Sir  Richmond  were  to 
stay  at  this  same  Old  George  Hotel.  The  luggage 
was  to  be  shifted  to  the  top  of  the  coupe,  the 
young  lady  called  V.V.  was  to  share  the  interior 
of  the  car  with  Sir  Richmond,  while  the  lady 
named  Belinda,  for  whom  Dr.  Martineau  was  al- 
ready developing  a  very  strong  dislike,  was  to  be 
thrust  into  an  extreme  proximity  with  him  and 
the  balance  of  the  luggage  in  the  dicky  seat 
behind. 

Sir  Richmond  had  never  met  with  a  young 
woman  with  a  genuine  historical  imagination  be- 
fore, and  he  was  evidently  very  greatly  excited 
and  resolved  to  get  the  utmost  that  there  was  to 
be  got  out  of  this  encounter. 


§3 

Sir  Richmond  displayed  a  complete  disregard 
of  the  Bufferings  of  Dr.  Martineau,  shamefully 
compressed  behind  him.  Of  these  he  was  to  hear 
later.  He  ran  his  overcrowded  little  car,  over- 
crowded so  far  as  the  dicky  went,  over  the  crest 
of  the  Down  and  down  into  Amesbnry  and  on  to 

Salisbury,  stopping  to  alighl  and  stretch  (lie  legs 
of  tin-  party  when  they  came  in  sight  of  Old 
Sarum. 


140         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"  Certainly  they  can  do  with  a  little  stretch- 
ing," said  Dr.  Martineau  grimly. 

This  charming  young  woman  had  seized  upon 
the  imagination  of  Sir  Richmond  to  the  tempo- 
rary exclusion  of  all  other  considerations.  The 
long  Downland  gradients,  quivering  very  slightly 
with  the  vibration  of  the  road,  came  swiftly  and 
easily  to  meet  and  pass  the  throbbing  little  car 
as  he  sat  beside  her  and  talked  to  her.  He  fell 
into  that  expository  manner  which  comes  so 
easily  to  the  native  entertaining  the  visitor  from 
abroad. 

"In  England,  it  seems  to  me  there  are  four  main 
phases  of  history.  Four.  Avebury,  which  I  would 
love  to  take  you  to  see  to-morrow.  Stonehenge. 
Old  Sarum,  which  we  shall  see  in  a  moment  as  a 
great  grassy  mound  on  our  right  as  we  come  over 
one  of  these  crests.  Each  of  them  represents 
about  a  thousand  years.  Old  Sarum  was  Keltic ;  it 
saw  the  Romans  and  the  Saxons  through,  and  for 
a  time  it  was  a  Norman  city.  Now  it  is  pasture  for 
sheep.  Latest  as  yet  is  Salisbury, — English,  real 
English.  It  may  last  a  few  centuries  still.  It  is 
little  more  than  seven  hundred  years  old.  But 
when  I  think  of  those  great  hangars  back  there  by 
Stonehenge,  I  feel  that  the  next  phase  is  already 
beginning.  Of  a  world  one  will  fly  to  the  ends 
of,  in  a  week  or  so.  Our  world  still.  Our  people^ 
your  people  and  mine,  who  are  going  to  take  wing 
so  soon  now,  were  made  in  all  these  places.    We 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE     141 

are  visiting  the  old  homes.  I  am  glad  I  came 
back  to  it  just  when  you  were  doing  the  same 
thing." 

' '  I  'm  lucky  to  have  found  a  sympathetic  fellow 
traveller,"  she  said;  "with  a  car." 

"You're  the  first  American  I've  ever  met  whose 

interest  in  history  didn't  seem "    He  sought 

for  an  inoffensive  word. 

"Silly?  Oh!  I  admit  it.  It's  true  of  a  lot  of 
us.  Most  of  us.  We  come  over  to  Europe  as  if 
it  hadn't  anything  to  do  with  us  except  to  supply 
us  with  old  pictures  and  curios  generally.  "We 
come  sight-seeing.  It's  romantic.  It's  pictur- 
esque. We  stare  at  the  natives — like  visitors  at  a 
Zoo.  We  don't  realize  that  wo  belong.  ...  I 
know  our  style.  .  .  .  But  wo  aren't  all  like 
that.  Some  of  us  are  learning  a  bit  better  than 
that.  We  have  one  or  two  teachers  over  there  to 
Lighten  our  darkness.  There's  Prof essor  Breasted 
for  instance.  lie  comes  sometimes  to  my  father's 
house.  And  there's  James  Harvey  Robinson  and 
Professor  Button  Webster.  They've  been  trying 
to  restore  our  memory." 

''I've  never  heard  of  .'my  of  lliom,"  said  Sir 
Richmond. 

"You  hear  so  little  of  America  over  here.  II  's 
quite  a  large  country  and  all  sorts  of  Interesting 
things  happen  there  nowadays.  Ami  we  are  wak- 
ing up  (o  history.  Quite  fast.  We  shan'1  always 
be  the  most  ignorant  people  in  the  world.    We  are 


142        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

beginning  to  realize  that  quite  a  lot  of  things  hap- 
pened between  Adam  and  the  Mayflower  that  we 
ought  to  be  told  about.  I  allow  it's  a  recent  re- 
vival. The  United  States  has  been  like  one  of 
those  men  you  read  about  in  the  papers  who  go 
away  from  home  and  turn  up  in  some  distant 
place  with  their  memories  gone.  They've  forgot- 
ten what  their  names  were  or  where  they  lived  or 
what  they  did  for  a  living;  they've  forgotten 
everything  that  matters.  Often  they  have  to  be- 
gin again  and  settle  down  for  a  long  time  before 
their  memories  come  back.  That's  how  it  has 
been  with  us.  Our  memory  is  just  coming  back 
to  us." 

"And  what  do  you  find  you  are?" 

"Europeans.  Who  came  away  from  kings  and 
churches — and  Corinthian  capitals." 

"You  feel  all  this  country  belongs  to  you!" 

"As  much  as  it  does  to  you." 

Sir  Richmond  smiled  radiantly  at  her.  "But 
if  I  say  that  America  belongs  to  me  as  much  as  it 
does  to  you?" 

"We  are  one  people,"  she  said. 

"We?" 

"Europe.  These  parts  of  Europe  anyhow. 
And  ourselves." 

"You  are  the  most  civilized  person  I've  met  for 
weeks  and  weeks." 

"Well,  you  are  the  first  civilized  person  I've 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      143 

met  in  Europe  for  a  long  time.  If  I  understand 
you." 

"There  are  multitudes  of  reasonable,  civilized 
people  in  Europe." 

"I've  heard  or  seen  very  little  of  them." 

"They're  scattered,  I  admit." 

"And  hard  to  find." 

"So  ours  is  a  lucky  meeting.  I've  wanted  a 
serious  talk  to  an  American  for  some  time.  I 
want  to  know  very  badly  what  you  think  you  are 
up  to  with  the  world, — our  world." 

"I'm  equally  anxious  to  know  what  England 
thinks  she  is  doing.  Her  ways  recently  have  been 
a  little  difficult  to  understand.  On  any  hypoth- 
esis— that  is  honourable  to  her." 

"H'm,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  assure  you  we  don't  like  it.  This  Irish  busi- 
ness. We  feel  a  sort  of  ownership  in  England. 
It's  like  finding  your  dearest  aunt  torturing  the 
cat." 

"We  must  talk  of  that,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  wish  you  would." 

"It  is  a  cat  and  a  dog — and  they  have  been 
very  naughty  animals.  And  poor  Aunt  Britannia 
almost  deliberately  lost  her  temper.  But  I  admit 
she  hits  about  in  a  very  nasty  fashion." 

"And  favours  the  dog?" 

"She  does." 

"I  want  to  know  all  you  admit." 


144        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"You  shall.  And  incidentally  my  friend  and 
I  may  have  the  pleasure  of  showing  you  Salisbury 
and  Avebury.    If  you  are  free  ? ' ' 

"We're  travelling  together,  just  we  two.  We're 
wandering  about  the  south  of  England  on  our 
way  to  Falmouth.  Where  I  join  a  father  in  a  few 
days'  time,  and  I  go  on  with  him  to  Paris.  And 
if  you  and  your  friend  are  coming  to  the  Old 
George ?" 

"We  are,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  see  no  great  scandal  in  talking  right  on  to 
bedtime.  And  seeing  Avebury  to-morrow.  Why 
not?  Perhaps  if  we  did  as  the  Germans  do  and 
gave  our  names  now,  it  might  mitigate  something 
of  the  extreme  informality  of  our  behaviour." 

"My  name  is  Hardy.  I've  been  a  munition 
manufacturer.  I  was  slightly  wounded  by  a  stray 
shell  near  Arras  while  I  was  inspecting  some 
plant  I  had  set  up,  and  also  I  was  hit  by  a  stray 
knighthood.  So  my  name  is  now  Sir  Richmond 
Hardy.  My  friend  is  a  very  distinguished  Harley 
Street  physician.  Chiefly  nervous  and  mental 
cases.  His  name  is  Dr.  Martineau.  He  is  quite 
as  civilized  as  I  am.  He  is  also  a  philosophical 
writer.  He  is  really  a  very  wise  and  learned  man 
indeed.  He  is  full  of  ideas.  He's  stimulated  me 
tremendously.    You  must  talk  to  him." 

Sir  Richmond  glanced  over  his  shoulder  at  the 
subject  of  these  commendations.     Through  the 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      145 

oval  window  glared  an  expression  of  malignity 
that  made  no  impression  whatever  on  his  preoc- 
cupied mind. 

"My  name,"  said  the  young  lady,  "is  Gram- 
mont.  The  war  whirled  me  over  to  Europe  on  Red 
Cross  work  and  since  the  peace  I've  been  settling 
up  things  and  travelling  about  Europe.  My 
father  is  rather  a  big  business  man  in  New  York." 

"The  oil  Grammont?" 

"He  is  rather  deep  in  oil,  I  believe.  He  is  com- 
ing over  to  Europe  because  he  does  not  like  the 
way  your  people  are  behaving  in  Mesopotamia. 
He  is  on  his  way  to  Paris  now.  Paris  it  seems  is 
where  everything  is  to  be  settled  against  you.  Be- 
linda is  a  sort  of  companion  I  have  acquired  for 
the  purposes  of  independent  travel.  She  was 
Red  Cross  too.  I  must  have  somebody  and  I  can- 
not bear  a  maid.  Her  name  is  Belinda  Seyffert. 
From  Philadelphia  originally.  You  have  that? 
Seyffert,  Grammont.'"' 

"And   Hardy?" 

"Sir  Richmond  and  Dr.  Martineau." 

"And — Aii! — That  great  green  bank  there  just 
coming  into  sight  must  be  Old  Sariun.  The  little 
ancient  city  that  faded  away  when  Salisbury 
lifted  if  -  .  pire  into  the  world.  We  will  stop  here 
for  a  little  while.  ..." 

Then  it  was  that  Dr.  Martineau  was  grim  about 
the  stretching  of  his  legs. 


146         SECRET  PLACES  OP  THE  HEART 

M 

The  sudden  prospect  which  now  opened  out  be- 
fore Sir  Richmond  of  talking  about  history  and 
suchlike  topics  with  a  charming  companion  for 
perhaps  two  whole  days  instead  of  going  on  with 
this  tiresome,  shamefaced,  egotistical  business  of 
self-examination  was  so  attractive  to  him  that  it 
took  immediate  possession  of  his  mind,  to  the  en- 
tire exclusion  and  disregard  of  Dr.  Martineau's 
possible  objections  to  any  such  modification  of 
their  original  programme.  When  they  arrived  in 
Salisbury,  the  doctor  did  make  some  slight  effort 
to  suggest  a  different  hotel  from  that  in  which  the 
two  ladies  had  engaged  their  rooms,  but  on  the 
spur  of  the  moment  and  in  their  presence  he 
could  produce  no  sufficient  reason  for  refusing  the 
accommodation  the  Old  George  had  ready  for  him. 
He  was  reduced  to  a  vague :  "We  don't  want  to 
inflict  ourselves "  He  could  not  get  Sir  Rich- 
mond aside  for  any  adequate  expression  of  his 
feelings  about  Miss  Seyffert,  before  the  four  of 
them  were  seated  together  at  tea  amidst  the  med- 
ieval modernity  of  the  Old  George  smoking-room. 
And  only  then  did  he  begin  to  realize  the  depth 
and  extent  of  the  engagements  to  which  Sir  Rich- 
mond had  committed  himself. 

"I  was  suggesting  that  we  run  back  to  Avebury 
to-morrow,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "These  ladies 
were  nearly  missing  it." 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STOXEHEXGE      147 

The  thing  took  the  doctor's  breath  away.  For 
the  moment  he  could  say  nothing.  He  stared  over 
his  tea-cup  dour-faced. 

An  objection  formulated  itself  very  slowly. 
"But  that  dicky,"  he  whispered. 

His  whisper  went  unnoted.  Sir  Richmond  was 
talking  of  the  completeness  of  Salisbury.  From 
the  very  beginning  it  had  been  a  cathedral  city; 
it  was  essentially  and  purely  that.  The  church  at 
its  best,  in  the  full  tide  of  its  mediaeval  ascend- 
ancy, had  called  it  into  being.  He  was  making 
some  extremely  loose  and  inaccurate  generaliza- 
tions about  the  buildings  and  ruins  each  age  had 
left  for  posterity,  and  Miss  Grammont  was  coun- 
tering with  equally  unsatisfactory  qualifications. 
"Our  age  will  leave  the  ruins  of  hotels,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.    "Railway  arches  and  hotels." 

"Baths  and  aqueducts,"  Miss  Grammont  com- 
pared. "Rome  of  the  Empire  comes  nearest  to 
it  " 

lit     •     •     • 

As  soon  as  tea  was  over,  Dr.  Mart  mean  real- 
ized, they  meant  to  walk  round  and  about  Salis- 
bury. He  foresaw  thai  walk  with  the  utmost  clear- 
ness. In  front  and  keeping  just  a  little  beyond  the 
range  of  his  intervention,  Sir  Richmond  would 
go  with  Miss  Grammont;  lie  himself  and  Miss 
Seyfferf  would  bring  up  the  rear.  ''If  1  do,"  he 
muttered,  "I'll  be  damned!"  an  unusually  strong 
expression  for  him. 

"You  said ?"  asked  Miss  SeyiTert. 


148        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"That  I  have  some  writing  to  do — before  the 
post  goes,"  said  the  doctor  brightly. 

"Oh!  come  and  see  the  cathedral!"  cried  Sir 
Richmond  with  ill-concealed  dismay.  He  was,  if 
one  may  put  it  in  such  a  fashion,  not  looking  at 
Miss  Seyffert  in  the  directest  fashion  when  he 
said  this. 

"I'm  afraid,"  said  the  doctor  mulishly.  "Im- 
possible." 

(With  the  unspoken  addition  of,  "You  try  her 
for  a  bit.") 

Miss  Grammont  stood  up.  Everybody  stood 
up.  "We  can  go  first  to  look  for  shops,"  she  said. 
"There's  those  things  you  want  to  buy,  Belinda; 
a  fountain  pen  and  the  little  books.  We  can  all 
go  together  as  far  as  that.  And  while  you  are 
shopping,  if  you  wouldn't  mind  getting  one  or 
two  things  for  me.  ..." 

It  became  clear  to  Dr.  Martineau  that  Sir  Rich- 
mond was  to  be  let  off  Belinda.  It  seemed  abom- 
inably unjust.  And  it  was  also  clear  to  him 
that  he  must  keep  closely  to  his  own  room  or  he 
might  find  Miss  Seyffert  drifting  back  alone  to 
the  hotel  and  eager  to  resume  with  him.  .  .  . 

Well,  a  quiet  time  in  his  room  would  not  be  dis- 
agreeable.   He  could  think  over  his  notes.  .  .  . 

But  in  reality  he  thought  over  nothing  but  the 
little  speeches  he  would  presently  make  to  Sir 
Richmond  about  the  unwarrantable,  the  abso- 
lutely unwarrantable,  alterations  that  were  being 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      149 

made  without  his  consent  in  their  common 
programme.  .  .  . 

For  a  long  time  Sir  Richmond  had  met  no  one 
so  interesting  and  amusing  as  this  frank-minded 
young  woman  from  America.  "Young  woman" 
was  how  he  thought  of  her ;  she  didn  't  correspond 
to  anything  so  prim  and  restrained  and  exten- 
sively reserved  and  withheld  as  a  "young  lady"; 
and  though  he  judged  her  no  older  than  five  and 
twenty,  the  word  "girl"  with  its  associations  of 
virginal  ignorances,  invisible  purdah,  and  trite 
ideas  newly  discovered,  seemed  even  less  appro- 
priate for  her  than  the  word  "boy."  She  had  an 
air  of  having  in  some  obscure  way  graduated  in 
life,  as  if  so  far  she  had  lived  each  several  year 
of  her  existence  in  a  distinctive  and  conclusive 
manner  with  the  utmost  mental  profit  and  no  par- 
ticular tarnish  or  injury.  He  could  talk  with  her 
as  if  he  talked  with  a  man  like  himself — but  with 
a  zest  no  man  could  give  him. 

It  was  evident  thai  the  good  things  she  had  said 
at  first  came  as  the  natural  expression  <>i'  a  broad 
stream  of  alert  thought;  they  were  no  mere  dis- 
play specimens  from  one  of  those  jackdaw  collec- 
tions of  bright  things  so  many  clever  women  waste 
their  wits  in  accumulating.  She  was  not  talking 
for  effect  at  all,  she  was  talking  becaui  e  I  In-  was 
tremendously  interested  in  her  discovery  of  the 
spectacle  of  history,  and  delighted  to  find  another 
person  as  possessed  as  she  was. 


150    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Belinda  having  been  conducted  to  her  shops, 
the  two  made  their  way  through  the  bright  eve- 
ning sunlight  to  the  compact  gracefulness  of  the 
cathedral.  A  glimpse  through  a  wrought-iron 
gate  of  a  delightful  garden  of  spring  flowers,  alys- 
sum,  aubrietia,  snow-upon-the-mountains,  daffo- 
dils, narcissus  and  the  like,  held  them  for  a  time, 
and  then  they  came  out  upon  the  level,  grassy 
space,  surrounded  by  little  ripe  old  houses,  on 
which  the  cathedral  stands.  They  stood  for  some 
moments  surveying  it. 

"It's  a  perfect  little  lady  of  a  cathedral,"  said 
Sir  Richmond.  "But  why,  I  wonder,  did  we  build 
it?" 

"Your  memory  ought  to  be  better  than  mine," 
she  said,  with  her  half -closed  eyes  blinking  up  at 
the  sunlit  spire  sharp  against  the  blue.  "I've 
been  away  for  so  long — over  there — that  I  forget 
altogether.    Why  did  we  build  it?" 

She  had  fallen  in  quite  early  with  this  freak 
of  speaking  and  thinking  as  if  he  and  she  were 
all  mankind.  It  was  as  if  her  mind  had  been  pre- 
pared 'for  it  by  her  own  eager  exploration  in  Eu- 
rope. ' '  My  friend,  the  philosopher, ' '  he  had  said, 
"will  not  have  it  that  we  are  really  the  individ- 
uals we  think  we  are.  You  must  talk  to  him — he 
is  a  very  curious  and  subtle  thinker.  We  are 
just  thoughts  in  the  Mind  of  the  Race,  he  says, 
passing  thoughts.  We  are — what  does  he  call  it? 
— Man  on  his  Planet,  taking  control  of  life.' 


>  j 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEIIENGE      151 

"Man  and  woman,"  she  had  amended. 

But  just  as  man  on  his  planet  taking  control  of 
life  had  failed  altogether  to  remember  why  the 
ditch  at  Avebury  was  on  the  inside  instead  of  the 
outside  of  the  vallum,  so  now  Miss  Grammont  and 
Sir  Richmond  found  very  great  difficulty  in  re- 
calling why  they  had  built  Salisbury  Cathedral. 

"We  built  temples  by  habit  and  tradition," 
said  Sir  Eichmond.  "But  the  impulse  was  losing 
its  force." 

She  looked  up  at  the  spire  and  then  at  him  with 
a  faintly  quizzical  expression. 

But  he  had  his  reply  ready. 

"We  were  beginning  to  feel  our  power  over 
matter.  "We  were  already  very  clever  engineers. 
What  interested  us  here  wasn't  the  old  religion 
any  more.  We  wanted  to  exercise  and  display  our 
power  over  stone.  We  made  it  into  reeds  and 
branches.  We  squirted  it  up  in  all  these  spires 
and  pinnacles.  The  priest  and  bis  altar  were  just 
an  excuse.  Do  you  think  people  have  ever  feared 
and  worshipped  in  this — this  artist's  lark — as  they 
did  in  Stonehenge?" 

"I  certainly  do  not  remember  1  hat  I  ever  wor- 
shipped here,"  she  said. 

Sir  Richmond  was  in  love  with  his  idea.  "The 
spirit  of  the  Gothic  cathedrals,"  he  said,  "is  the 
spirit  of  the  sky-scrapers.  If  Ls  architecture  in  a 
mood  of  flaming  ambition.  The  Freemasons  on 
the  building  could  hardly  refrain  from  jeering  at 


152         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  little  priest  they  had  left  clown  below  there, 
performing  antiquated  puerile  mysteries  at  his 
altar.    He  was  just  their  excuse  for  doing  it  all." 

1 '  Sky-scrapers  ? ' '  she  conceded.  ' '  An  early  dis- 
play of  the  sky-scraper  spirit.  .  .  .  You  are  do- 
ing your  best  to  make  me  feel  thoroughly  at 
home." 

"You  are  more  at  home  here  still  than  in  that 
new  country  of  ours  over  the  Atlantic.  But  it 
seems  to  me  now  that  I  do  begin  to  remember 
building  this  cathedral — and  all  the  other  cathe- 
drals we  built  in  Europe.  ...  It  was  the  fun  of 
building  made  us  do  it.  .  .  ." 

"H'm,"  she  said.    "And  my  sky-scrapers?" 

"Still  the  fun  of  building.  That  is  the  thing 
I  envy  most  about  America.  It's  still  large 
enough,  mentally  and  materially,  to  build  all  sorts 
of  things.  .  .  .  Over  here,  the  sites  are  frightfully 
crowded.  ..." 

"And  what  do  you  think  we  are  building  now? 
And  what  do  you  think  you  are  building  over 
here?" 

1  *  What  are  we  building  now  ?  I  believe  we  have 
almost  grown  up.  I  believe  it  is  time  we  began  to 
build  in  earnest.    For  good.  .  .  . 

"But  are  we  building  anything  at  all?" 

"A  new  world." 

"Show  it  me,"  she  said. 

"We're  still  only  at  the  foundations,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.    "Nothing  shows  as  yet." 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      153 

"I  wish  I  could  believe  they  were  foundations." 
"But   can  you   doubt   we   are   scrapping   the 
old?  .  .  ." 

It  was  too  late  in  the  afternoon  to  go  into  the 
cathedral,  so  they  strolled  to  and  fro  round  and 
about  the  west  end  and  along  the  path  under  the 
trees  towards  the  river,  exchanging  their  ideas 
very  frankly  and  freely  about  the  things  that  had 
recently  happened  to  the  world  and  what  they 
thought  they  ought  to  be  doing  in  it. 

After  dinner  our  four  tourists  sat  late  and 
talked  in  a  corner  of  the  smoking-room.  The  two 
ladies  had  vanished  hastily  at  the  first  dinner 
gong  and  reappeared  at  the  second,  mysteriously 
and  pleasantly  changed  From  tweedy  pedestrians 
to  indoor  company.  They  were  quietly  but  defi- 
nitely dressed,  pretty  alterations  bad  happened  to 
their  coiffure,  a  silver  band  and  deep  red  stones 
lit  the  dusk  of  Miss  Grammont's  hair  and  a  neck- 
lace of  the  same  colourings  kept  the  peace  be- 
tween her  jolly  sun  burni  cheek  and  her  soft  on- 
tanned  aeck.  It  was  evidenl  her  recent  uniform 
had  included  a  collar  of  great  severity.  Miss 
Seyfferl  had  revealed  a  plump  forearm  and  pro- 
claimed il  wilh  a  clash  of  bangles.  Dr.  Marlineau 
thoughl  her  evening  throal  much  too  confidential. 

The  conversation  drifted  from  topic  to  topic. 


154    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

It  had  none  of  the  steady  continuity  of  Sir  Rich- 
mond's duologue  with  Miss  Grammont.  Miss 
Seyffert 's  methods  were  too  discursive  and  ex- 
clamatory. She  broke  every  thread  that  ap- 
peared. The  Old  George  at  Salisbury  is  really 
old;  it  shows  it,  and  Miss  Seyffert  laced  the  en- 
tire evening  with  her  recognition  of  the  fact. 
"Just  look  at  that  old  beam!"  she  would  cry  sud- 
denly. "To  think  it  was  exactly  where  it  is  be- 
fore there  was  a  Cabot  in  America ! ' ' 

Miss  Grammont  let  her  companion  pull  the  talk 
about  as  she  chose.  After  the  animation  of  the 
afternoon  a  sort  of  lazy  contentment  had  taken 
possession  of  the  younger  lady.  She  sat  deep  in 
a  basket  chair  and  spoke  now  and  then.  Miss 
Seyffert  gave  her  impressions  of  France  and  Italy. 
She  talked  of  the  cabmen  of  Naples  and  the  beg- 
gars of  Amalfi. 

Apropos  of  beggars,  Miss  Grammont  from  the 
depths  of  her  chair  threw  out  the  statement  that 
Italy  was  frightfully  overpopulated.  "In  some 
parts  of  Italy  it  is  like  mites  on  a  cheese.  Nobody 
seems  to  be  living.  Everyone  is  too  busy  keeping 
alive." 

"Poor  old  women  carrying  loads  big  enough 
for  mules,"  said  Miss  Seyffert. 

"Little  children  working  like  slaves,"  said  Miss 
Grammont. 

"And  everybody  begging.    Even  the  people  at 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE     155 

work  by  the  roadside.  Who  ought  to  be  getting 
wages — sufficient.  ..." 

"Begging — from  foreigners — is  just  a  sport  in 
Italy,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "It  doesn't  imply 
want.  But  I  agree  that  a  large  part  of  Italy  is 
frightfully  overpopulated.  The  whole  world  is. 
Don't  you  think  so,  Martineau?" 

"Well — yes — for  its  present  social  organiza- 
tion." 

"For  any  social  organization,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond. 

"I've  no  doubt  of  it,"  said  Miss  Seyffert,  and 
added  amazingly :  "I'm  out  for  Birth  Control  all 
the  time." 

A  brief  but  active  pause  ensued.  Dr.  Martineau 
in  a  state  of  sudden  distress  attempted  to  drink 
out  of  a  cold  and  empty  coffee  cup. 

"The  world  swarms  with  cramped  and  unde- 
veloped lives,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "Which 
amount  to  nothing.  Which  do  not  even  represent 
happiness.  And  which  help  to  use  up  the  re- 
sources, the  fuel  and  surplus  energy  of  the 
world." 

"I  suppose  they  have  a  sort  of  liking  for  their 

lives,"  Miss  Grammont  reflected. 

"Does  thai  matter)  They  do  nothing  to  carry 
life  on.  They  are  just  vain  repetitions  -imper- 
fect— dreary,  blurred  repetitions  of  one  common 
life.    All  that  they  feel  has  been  felt,  all  that  they 


156         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

do  has  been  done  better  before.  Because  they  are 
crowded  and  hurried  and  underfed  and  underedu- 
cated.  And  as  for  liking  their  lives,  they  need 
never  have  had  the  chance. ' ' 

1 'How  many  people  are  there  in  the  world?" 
she  asked  abruptly. 

"I  don't  know.  Twelve  hundred,  fifteen  hun- 
dred millions  perhaps." 

"And  in  your  world?" 

"I'd  have  two  hundred  and  fifty  millions,  let 
us  say.  At  most.  It  would  be  quite  enough  for 
this  little  planet,  for  a  time,  at  any  rate.  Don't 
you  think  so,  doctor?" 

"I  don't  know,"  said  Dr.  Martineau.  "Oddly 
enough,  I  have  never  thought  about  that  question 
before.    At  least,  not  from  this  angle. ' ' 

"But  could  you  pick  out  two  hundred  and 
fifty  million  aristocrats  ? ' '  began  Miss  Grammont. 
"My  native  instinctive  democracy " 

"Need  not  be  outraged,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
"Any  two  hundred  and  fifty  million  would  do, 
They'd  be  able  to  develop  fully,  all  of  them.  As 
things  are„  only  a  minority  can  do  that.  The  rest 
never  get  a  chance." 

"That's  what  I  always  say,"  said  Miss 
Seyffert. 

"A  New  Age,"  said  Dr.  Martineau;  "a  New 
World.  We  may  be  coming  to  such  a  stage,  when 
population,  as  much  as  fuel,  will  be  under  a  world 
control.    If  one  thing,  why  not  the  other?    I  admit 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      157 

that  the  movement  of  thought  is  away  from  hap- 
hazard towards  control " 

"I'm  for  control  all  the  time,"  Miss  Seyffert 
injected,  following  up  her  previous  success. 

"I  admit,"  the  doctor  began  his  broken  sen- 
tence again  with  marked  patience,  "that  the  move- 
ment of  thought  is  away  from  haphazard  towards 
control — in  things  generally.  But  is  the  move- 
ment of  events?" 

"The  eternal  problem  of  man,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond.   "Can  our  wills  prevail?" 

There  came  a  little  pause. 

Miss  Grammont  smiled  an  enquiry  at  Miss 
Seyffert.    "If  you  are,"  said  Belinda. 

"I  wish  I  could  imagine  your  world,"  said  Miss 
Grammont,  rising,  "of  two  hundred  and  fifty  mil- 
lions of  fully  developed  human  beings  with  room 
to  live  and  breathe  in  and  no  need  for  wars.  WiU 
they  live  in  palaces?  Will  they  all  be  healthy! 
.  .  .  Machines  will  wait  on  them.  No!  I  can't 
imagine  it.  Perhaps  I  shall  dream  of  it.  My 
dreaming  self  may  be  cleverer." 

She  held  out  her  hand  to  Sir  Richmond.  Just 
for  a  moment  they  stood  hand  in  hand,  appre- 
ciatively. .  .  . 

"Well  ["said  Dr.  Martineau,  as  the  door  closed 
behind  the  two  Americans,  "This  is  a  curious — 
encounter." 

"That    young    woman    has    brail  said    Sir 

Richmond,  standing  before  the  fireplai 


158         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

There  was  no  doubt  whatever  which  young 
woman  he  meant.    But  Dr.  Martineau  grunted. 

"I  don't  like  the  American  type,"  the  doctor 
pronounced  judicially. 

"I  do,"  Sir  Richmond  countered. 

The  doctor  thought  for  a  moment  or  so.  "You 
are  committed  to  the  project  of  visiting  Ave- 
bury?" he  said. 

"They  ought  to  see  Avebury,"  said  Sir 
Eichmond. 

"H'm,"  said  the  doctor,  ostentatiously  amused 
by  his  thoughts  and  staring  at  the  fire.  "Birth 
Control!    I  never  did." 

Sir  Richmond  smiled  down  on  the  top  of  the 
doctor's  head  and  said  nothing. 

"I  think,"  said  the  doctor  and  paused.  .  .  . .  "I 
shall  leave  this  Avebury  expedition  to  you." 

"We  can  be  back  in  the  early  afternoon,"  said 
Sir  Richmond.  "To  give  them  a  chance  of  see- 
ing the  cathedral.  The  chapter  house  here  is 
not  one  to  miss.  ..." 

"And  then  I  suppose  we  shall  go  on?" 

"As  you  please,"  said  Sir  Richmond  insin- 
cerely. 

"I  must  confess  that  four  people  make  the 
car  at  any  rate  seem  tremendously  overpopu- 
lated.  And  to  tell  the  truth,  I  do  not  find  this 
encounter  so  amusing  as  you  seem  to  do.  ...  I 
shall  not  be  sorry  when  we  have  waved  good-bye 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      159 

to  those  young  ladies,  and  resume  our  interrupted 
conversation. ' ' 

Sir  Richmond  considered  something  mulish  in 
the  doctor's  averted  face. 

"I  find  Miss  Grammont  an  extremely  interest- 
ing— and  stimulating  human  being." 

"Evidently." 

The  doctor  sighed,  stood  up  and  found  himself 
delivering  one  of  the  sentences  he  had  engendered 
during  his  solitary  meditations  in  his  room  before 
dinner.  He  surprised  himself  by  the  plainness  of 
his  speech.  "Let  me  be  frank,"  he  said,  regard- 
ing Sir  Richmond  squarely.  "Considering  the 
general  situation  of  things  and  your  position,  I 
do  not  care  very  greatly  for  the  part  of  an  acces- 
sory to  what  may  easily  develop,  as  you  know  very 
well,  into  a  very  serious — flirtation.  An  absurd, 
mischievous,  irrelevant  flirtation.  You  may  not 
like  the  word.  You  may  pretend  it  is  a  conversa- 
tion, an  ordinary  Intellectual  conversation.  That 
is  not  the  word.  Simply  that  is  not  the  word. 
Von  people  eye  one  another.  .  .  .  Flirtation.  I 
give  the  affair  its  proper  name.     That  is  all. 

Merely  that.    When  1  think But  we  will  not 

discuss  if  now.  .  .  .  Good  night.  .  .  .  Forgive 
me  if  1  put  before  yen,  rather  bluntly,  my  particu- 
lar point  of  view." 

Sir  Richmond  found  himself  alone.  With  his 
eyebrows  raised. 


160         SECRET  PLAGES  OF  THE  HEART, 


§6 

After  twenty-four  eventful  hours  our  two  stu- 
dents of  human  motives  found  themselves  to- 
gether again  by  the  fireplace  in  the  Old  George 
smoking-room.  They  had  resumed  their  over- 
night conversation,  in  a  state  of  considerable 
tension. 

'•'If  you  find  the  accommodation  of  the  car  insuf- 
ficient," said  Sir  Richmond  in  a  tone  of  extreme 
reasonableness,  "and  I  admit  it  is,  we  can  easily 
hire  a  larger  car  in  a  place  like  this." 

''I  would  not  care  if  you  hired  an  omnibus," 
said'Dr.  Martineau.  "I  am  not  coming  on  if  these 
young  women  are." 

"But  if  you  consider  it  scandalous — and  really, 
Martineau,  really !  as  one  man  to  another,  it  does 
seem  to  me  to  be  a  bit  pernickety  of  you,  a  broad 
and  original  thinker  as  you  are ' ' 

"Thought  is  one  matter.  Rash,  inconsiderate 
action  quite  another.  And  above  all,  if  I  spend 
another  day  in  or  near  the  company  of  Miss  Be- 
linda Seyffert  I  shall — I  shall  be  extremely  rude 
to  her." 

"But,"  said  Sir  Richmond  and  bit  his  lower  lip 
and  considered. 

"We  might  drop  Belinda,"  he  suggested — 
turning  to  his  friend  and  speaking  in  low,  confi- 
dential tones.    "She  is  quite  a  manageable  per- 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      161 

son.  Quite.  She  could — for  example — be  left  be- 
hind with  the  luggage  and  sent  on  by  train.  I  do 
not  know  if  you  realize  how  the  land  lies  in  that 
quarter.  It  needs  only  a  word  to  Miss 
Grammont. ' ' 

There  was  no  immediate  reply.  For  a  moment 
he  had  a  wild  hope  that  his  companion  would  agree, 
and  then  he  perceived  that  the  doctor's  silence 
meant  only  the  preparation  of  an  ultimatum. 

''I  object  to  Miss  Grammont  and — that  side  of 
the  thing,  more  than  I  do  to  Miss  Seyffert." 

Sir  Richmond  said  nothing. 

"It  may  help  you  to  see  this  affair  from  a 
slightly  different  angle  if  I  tell  you  that  twice  to- 
day Miss  Seyffert  has  asked  me  if  you  were  a 
married  man." 

"And  of  course  you  told  her  I  was." 

"On  the  second  occasion." 

Sir  Richmond  smiled  again. 

"Frankly,"  said  the  doctor,  "this  adventure  is 
altogether  uncongenial  to  me.  It  is  the  sort  of 
thing  thai  ha  i  never  happened  in  my  life.  This 
highway  coupling " 

"DonM  you  think,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  "that 
you  are  attaching  rather  too  much — what  shall  I 

say — romantic  f — flirtatious  .'--meaning  to  this 
affair?  I  don't  mind  that  after  my  rather  lavish 
confessions  you  should  consider  me  a  rather  over- 
sexed person,  hut  I  your  attitude  rather  un- 
fair,—unjust,  indeed,  and  almoi  t  Insulting,  to  this 


162        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Miss  Grammont?  After  all,  she's  a  young  lady  of 
very  good  social  position  indeed.  She  doesn't 
strike  you — does  she  f — as  an  undignified  or  help- 
less human  being.  Her  manners  suggest  a  person 
of  considerable  self-control.  And  knowing  less  of 
me  than  you  do,  she  probably  regards  me  as  al- 
most as  safe  as — a  maiden  aunt  say.  I'm  twice 
her  age.  We  are  a  party  of  four.  There  are  con- 
ventions, there  are  considerations.  .  .  .  Aren't 
you  really,  my  dear  Martineau,  overdoing  all  this 
side  of  this  very  pleasant  little  enlargement  of 
our  interests." 

(( Am  I?"  said  Dr.  Martineau  and  brought  a 
scrutinizing  eye  to  bear  on  Sir  Richmond's  face. 

"I  want  to  go  on  talking  to  Miss  Grammont  for 
a  day  or  so, ' '  Sir  Richmond  admitted. 

"Then  I  shall  prefer  to  leave  your  party." 

There  were  some  moments  of  silence. 

"I  am  really  very  sorry  to  find  myself  in  this 
dilemma,"  said  Sir  Richmond  with  a  note  of  gen- 
uine regret  in  his  voice. 

"It  is  not  a  dilemma,"  said  Dr.  Martineau, 
with  a  corresponding  loss  of  asperity.  "I  grant 
you  we  discover  we  differ — upon  a  question  of 
taste  and  convenience.  But  before  I  suggested 
this  trip,  I  had  intended  to  spend  a  little  time 
with  my  old  friend  Sir  Kenelm  Latter  at  Bourne- 
mouth.     Nothing    simpler    than    to    go    to    him 


now.  .  .  ." 


"I  shall  be  sorry  all  the  same." 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      163 

"I  could  have  wished,"  said  the  doctor,  "that 
these  ladies  had  happened  a  little  later.  ..." 

The  matter  was  settled.  Nothing  more  of  a 
practical  nature  remained  to  be  said.  But  neither 
gentleman  wished  to  break  off  with  a  harsh  and 
bare  decision. 

"When  the  New  Age  is  here,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond, i  l  then,  surely,  a  friendship  between  a  man 
and  a  woman  will  not  be  subjected  to  the — the  in- 
conveniences your  present  code  would  set  about 
it?  They  would  travel  about  together  as  they 
chose?" 

"The  fundamental  principle  of  the  new  age," 
said  the  doctor,  "will  be  Uoni  soit  qui  mat  y 
pense.  In  these  matters.  With  perhaps  Fay  ce 
que  vouldras  as  its  next  injunction.  So  long  as 
other  lives  are  not  affected.  In  matters  of  per- 
sonal behaviour  the  world  will  probably  be  much 
more  free  and  individuals  much  more  open  in 
their  conscience  and  honour  than  they  have  ever 
been  before.  In  matters  of  property,  economics 
and  public  conduct  it  will  probably  be  just  the  re- 
verse. Then,  there  will  be  much  more  collective 
control  and  much  more  insistence,  legal  insist- 
ence, upon  individual  responsibility.  But  we  are 
not  living  in  a  new  age  yet ;  we  are  living  m  (he 
patched  up  rains  of  a  very  old  one.  And  you — 
if  you  will  forgive  me — are  living  in  the  patched- 
up  remains  of  a  life  thai  had  already  had  Its 
complications.   T!  '.  dy,  v  hose  charm  and 


164        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

cleverness  I  admit,  behaves  as  if  the  new  age 
were  already  here.  Well,  that  may  be  a  very  dan- 
gerous mistake  both  for  her  and  for  you.  .  .  . 
This  affair,  if  it  goes  on  for  a  few  days  more,  may 
involve  very  serious  consequences  indeed,  with 
which  I,  for  one,  do  not  wish  to  be  involved. ' ' 

Sir  Richmond,  upon  the  hearthrug,  had  a  curi- 
ous feeling  that  he  was  back  in  the  head  master's 
study  at  Caxton. 

Dr.  Martineau  went  on  with  a  lucidity  that  Sir 
Richmond  found  rather  trying,  to  give  his  impres- 
sion of  Miss  Gramniont  and  her  position  in  life. 

"She  is,"  he  said,  "manifestly  a  very  expen- 
sively educated  girl.  And  in  many  ways — inter- 
esting. I  have  been  watching  her.  I  have  not  been 
favoured  with  very  much  of  her  attention,  but 
that  fact  has  enabled  me  to  see  her  in  profile. 
Miss  Seyffert  is  a  fairly  crude  mixture  of  frank- 
ness, insincerity  and  self-explanatory  egotism, 
and  I  have  been  able  to  disregard  a  considerable 
amount  of  the  conversation  she  has  addressed  to 
me.  Now  I  guess  this  Miss  Grammont  has  had  no 
mother  since  she  was  quite  little." 

"Your  guesses,  doctor,  are  apt  to  be  pretty 
good,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"You  know  that?" 

"She  has  told  me  as  much." 

"H'm.    Well She  impressed  me  as  having 

the  air  of  a  girl  who  has  had  to  solve  many  prob- 
lems for  which  the  normal  mother  provides  ready- 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      165 

made  solutions.  That  is  how  I  inferred  that  there 
was  no  mother.  I  don't  think  there  has  been  any 
stepmother,  either  friendly  or  hostile?  There 
hasn't  been.  I  thought  not.  She  has  had  various 
governesses  and  companions,  ladies  of  birth  and 
education,  engaged  to  look  after  her  and  she  has 
done  exactly  what  she  liked  with  them.  Her  man- 
ner with  Miss  Seyffert,  an  excellent  manner  for 
Miss  Seyffert,  by  the  bye,  isn't  the  sort  of  manner 
anyone  acquires  in  a  day.  Or  for  one  person 
only.  She  is  a  very  sure  and  commanding  young 
woman." 

Sir  Richmond  nodded. 

"I  suppose  her  father  adores  and  neglects  her, 
ami  whenever  she  has  wanted  a  companion  or 
governess  butchered,  the  thing  has  been  done.  .  .  . 
These  business  Americans,  I  am  told,  neglect  their 
womankind,  give  them  money  and  power,  let  them 
Loose  on  the  world.  ...  It  is  a  sort  of  moral 
laziness  masquerading  as  affection.  .  .  .  Still  I 
suppoi  e  custom  and  1  radition  kept  this  girl  in  her 
place  and  she  was  petted,  honoured,  amused, 
talked  aboul  bul  qoI  in  a  harmful  way,  and  rather 
bored  right  up  to  the  time  when  America  came  into 
tin-  war.  Theoretically  Bhe  had  a  tremendously 
•d  time." 

"  I  think  this  must  be  near  the  truth  of  her  biog- 
raphy," said  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  suppose  she  lias  Lovers." 

"You  don't  mean ?" 


166         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"No,  I  don't.  Though  that  is  a  matter  that 
ought  to  have  no  special  interest  for  you.  I  mean 
that  she  was  surrounded  by  a  retinue  of  men  who 
wanted  to  marry  her  or  who  behaved  as  though 
they  wanted  to  marry  her  or  who  made  her  hap- 
piness and  her  gratifications  and  her  condescen- 
sions seem  a  matter  of  very  great  importance  to 
them.  She  had  the  flattery  of  an  extremely  un- 
critical and  unexacting  admiration.  That  is  the 
sort  of  thing  that  gratifies  a  silly  woman  ex- 
tremely. Miss  Grammont  is  not  silly  and  all  this 
homage  and  facile  approval  probably  bored  her 
more  than  she  realized.  To  anyone  too  intelligent 
to  be  steadily  excited  by  buying  things  and  wear- 
ing things  and  dancing  and  playing  games  and  go- 
ing to  places  of  entertainment,  and  being  given 
flowers,  sweets,  jewellery,  pet  animals,  and  books 
bound  in  a  special  sort  of  leather,  the  prospect  of 
being  a  rich  man's  only  daughter  until  such  time 
as  it  becomes  advisable  to  change  into  a  rich  man's 
wealthy  wife,  is  probably  not  nearly  so  amusing 
as  envious  people  might  suppose.  I  take  it  Miss 
Grammont  had  got  all  she  could  out  of  that  sort 
of  thing  some  time  before  the  war,  and  that  she 
had  already  read  and  thought  rather  more  than 
most  young  women  in  her  position.  Before  she 
was  twenty  I  guess  she  was  already  looking  for 
something  more  interesting  in  the  way  of  men 
than  a  rich  admirer  with  an  automobile  full  of 
presents.    Those  who  seek  find." 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      167 

"What  do  you  think  she  found?" 

"What  would  a  rich  girl  find  out  there  in  Amer- 
ica? I  don't  know.  I  haven't  the  material  to 
guess  with.  In  London  a  girl  might  find  a  consid- 
erable variety  of  active,  interesting  men,  rising 
politicians,  university  men  of  distinction,  artists 
and  writers  even,  men  of  science,  men — there  are 
still  such  men — active  in  the  creative  work  of  the 
empire. 

"In  America  I  suppose  there  is  at  least  an  equal 
variety,  made  up  of  rather  different  types.  She 
would  find  that  life  was  worth  while  to  such  peo- 
ple in  a  way  that  made  the  ordinary  entertain- 
ments and  amusements  of  her  life  a  monstrous 
silly  waste  of  time.  With  the  facility  of  her  sex 
she  would  pick  up  from  one  of  them  the  idea  that 
made  life  worth  while  for  him.  I  am  inclined  to 
tli ink  there  was  someone  in  her  case  who  did  seem 
to  promise  a  sort  of  life  that  was  worth  while. 
And  that  somehow  the  war  came  to  alter  the  look 
of  thai  promise." 

"How;"' 

"I  don't  know.  Perhaps  I  am  only  romancing. 
But  for  this  young  woman  I  am  convinced  this 
e:  peditioD  to  Europe  has  meant — experience, 
harsh  educational  experience  and  very  profound 
ment .il  di  Uirbance.  There  have  been  love  experi- 
ences;  experiences  thai  were  something  more  than 
the  treats  and  attentions  ;  n  w  I  proposals  thai  made 
up  her  life  when  she  was  sheltered  over  there. 


168        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

And  something  more  than  that.  What  it  is  I  don't 
know.  The  war  has  turned  an  ugly  face  to  her. 
She  has  seen  death  and  suffering  and  ruin.  Per- 
haps she  has  seen  people  she  knew  killed.  Perhaps 
the  man  has  been  killed.  Or  she  has  met  with 
cowardice  or  cruelty  or  treachery  where  she  didn't 
expect  it.  She  has  been  shocked  out  of  the  first 
confidence  of  youth.  She  has  ceased  to  take  the 
world  for  granted.  ...  It  hasn't  broken  her  but 
it  has  matured  her.  .  .  .  That  I  think  is  why  his- 
tory has  become  real  to  her.  Which  so  attracts 
you  in  her.  History,  for  her,  has  ceased  to  be  a 
fabric  of  picturesque  incidents ;  it  is  the  study  of 
a  tragic  struggle  that  still  goes  on.  She  sees  his- 
tory as  you  see  it  and  I  see  it.  She  is  a  very 
grown-up  young  woman.   .    .    . " 

"  It 's  just  that, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond.  ' l  It 's  just 
that.  If  you  see  as  much  in  Miss  Grammont  as 
all  that,  why  don't  you  want  to  come  on  with  us? 
You  see  the  interest  of  her." 

"I  see  a  lot  more  than  that.  You  don't  know 
what  an  advantage  it  is  to  be  as  I  am,  rather  cold 
and  unresponsive  to  women  and  unattractive  and 
negligible — negligible,  that  is  the  exact  word — to 
them.  You  can 't  look  at  a  woman  for  five  minutes 
without  losing  sight  of  her  in  a  mist  of  imaginative 
excitement.  Because  she  looks  back  at  you.  I 
have  the  privilege  of  the  negligible — which  is  a 
cool  head.  Miss  Grammont  has  a  startled  and 
matured  mind,  an  original  mind.    Yes.    And  there 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      169 

is  something  more  to  be  said.  Her  intelligence  is 
better  than  her  character." 

"I  don't  quite  see  what  you  are  driving  at." 

"The  intelligence  of  all  intelligent  women  is 
better  than  their  characters.  Goodness  in  a 
woman,  as  we  understand  it,  seems  to  imply  neces- 
sarily a  certain  imaginative  fixity.  Miss  Gram- 
mont  has  an  impulsive  and  adventurous  character. 
And  as  I  have  been  saying  she  was  a  spoilt  child, 
with  no  discipline.  .  .  .  You  also  are  a  person 
of  high  intelligence  and  defective  controls.  She 
is  very  much  at  loose  ends.  You — on  account  of 
the  illness  of  that  rather  forgotten  lady,  Miss  Mar- 
tin Leeds " 

"Aren't  you  rather  abusing  the  secrets  of  the 
confessional?" 

"This  is  the  confessional.  It  closes  to-morrow 
morning  but  it  is  the  confessional  still.  Look  at 
the  thing  frankly.  You,  I  say,  are  also  at  loose 
ends.  Can  you  deny  it?  My  dear  sir,  don't  we 
both  know  that  ever  since  we  lefl  London  you 
have  been  ready  to  fall  in  love  with  any  pretty 
thing  in  petticoats  thai  seemed  to  promise  you 
three  ha'porth  of  kindness.  A  lost  dog  looking 
for  a  master!  You're  a  stray  man  looking  for  a 
mistress.  Miss  (Jranmiont  being  a  woman  is  a  lit- 
tle more  selective  than  that.  But  if  she's  at  a  loose 

end  as  1  suppose,  sin-  isn't  protected  by  the  sense 
of  having  made  her  selection.  And  she  has  no 
preconceptions  of  what  she  wants.    Son  are  a  very 


170        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

interesting  man  in  many  ways.  You  carry  mar- 
riage and — entanglements  lightly.  With  an  air  of 
being  neither  married  nor  entangled.  She  is  quite 
prepared  to  fall  in  love  with  you." 

"But  you  don't  really  think  that?"  said  Sir 
Richmond,  with  an  ill-concealed  eagerness. 

Dr.  Martineau  rolled  his  face  towards  Sir  Rich- 
mond. ' '  These  miracles  —  grotesquely  —  hap- 
pen," he  said.  "She  knows  nothing  of  Martin 
Leeds.  .  .  .  You  must  remember  that.  .  .  . 

"And  then,"  he  added,  "if  she  and  you  fall  in 
love,  as  the  phrase  goes,  what  is  to  follow?" 

There  was  a  pause. 

Sir  Richmond  looked  at  his  toes  for  a  moment 
or  so  as  if  he  took  counsel  with  them  and  then 
decided  to  take  offence. 

"Really!"  he  said,  "this  is  preposterous.  You 
talk  of  falling  in  love  as  though  it  was  impossible 
for  a  man  and  woman  to  be  deeply  interested  in 
each  other — without  that.  And  the  gulf  in  our 
ages — in  our  quality!  From  the  Psychologist  of 
a  New  Age  I  find  this  amazing.  Are  men  and 
women  to  go  on  for  ever — separated  by  this  pos- 
sibility into  two  hardly  communicating  and  yet 
interpenetrating  worlds?  Is  there  never  to  be 
friendship  and  companionship  between  men  and 
women  without  passion  ? ' ' 

"You  ought  to  know  even  better  than  I  do  that 
there  is  not.  For  such  people  as  you  two  anyhow. 
And  at  present  the  world  is  not  prepared  to  toler- 


THE  ENCOUNTER  AT  STONEHENGE      171 

ate  friendship  and  companionship  ivith  that  ac* 
companiment.    That  is  the  core  of  this  situation.' ' 

A  pause  fell  between  the  two  gentlemen.  They 
had  smoothed  over  the  extreme  harshness  of  their 
separation  and  there  was  very  little  more  to  be 
said. 

"Well,"  said  Sir  Richmond  in  conclusion,  "I 
am  very  sorry  indeed,  Martineau,  that  we  have  to 
part  like  this." 


CHAPTER  THE  SEVENTH 

COMPANIONSHIP 
§1 

"Well,"  said  Dr.  Martineau,  extending  his 
hand  to  Sir  Richmond  on  the  Salisbury  station 
platform,  "I  leave  you  to  it." 

His  round  face  betrayed  little  or  no  vestiges  of 
his  overnight  irritation. 

"Ought  you  to  leave  me  to  it?"  smiled  Sir 
Richmond. 

"I  shall  be  interested  to  learn  what  happens." 

"But  if  you  won't  stay  to  see!" 

"Now  sir,  please,"  said  the  guard  respectfully 
but  firmly,  and  Dr.  Martineau  got  in. 

Sir  Richmond  walked  thoughtfully  down  the 
platform  towards  the  exit. 

"What  else  could  I  do?"  he  asked  aloud  to 
nobody  in  particular. 

For  a  little  while  he  thought  confusedly  of  the 
collapse  of  his  expedition  into  the  secret  places 
of  his  own  heart  with  Dr.  Martineau,  and  then 
his  prepossession  with  Miss  Grammont  resumed 
possession  of  his  mind.  Dr.  Martineau  was 
forgotten. 

172 


COMPANIONSHIP  173 


$2 


For  the  better  part  of  forty  hours,  Sir  Eich- 
mond  had  either  been  talking  to  Miss  Grammont, 
or  carrying  on  imaginary  conversations  with  her 
in  her  absence,  or  sleeping  and  dreaming  dreams 
in  which  she  never  failed  to  play  a  part,  even  if  at 
times  it  was  an  altogether  amazing  and  incon- 
gruous part.  And  as  they  were  both  very  frank 
and  expressive  people,  they  already  knew  a  very 
great  deal  about  each  other. 

For  an  American  Miss  Grammont  was  by  no 
means  autobiographical.  She  gave  no  sketches 
of  her  idiosyncrasies,  and  she  repeated  no  remem- 
bered comments  and  prophets  of  her  contempo- 
raries about  herself.  She  either  concealed  or  she 
had  lost  any  great  interest  in  her  own  personal- 
ity. But  she  was  interested  in  and  curious  about 
the  people  she  had  met  in  life,  and  her  talk  of  them 
reflected  a  considerable  amount  of  light  upon  her 
own  upbringing  and  experiences.  And  her  liking 
for  Sir  Richmond  was  pleasingly  manifest.  She 
liked  his  turn  of  thought,  she  watched  him  with  a 
tain!  smile  on  her  lips  as  he  spoke,  and  she  spread 
her  "pinions  before  liim  carefully  in  that  soft  voice 
of  hers  like  a  shy  child  showing  its  treasures  to 
some  suddenly  trusted  and  favoured  visitor. 

Their  ways  of  thoughl  harmonized.  They 
talked  .-it   lirst  chiefly  about  the  history  of  the 


174         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

world  and  the  extraordinary  situation  of  aimless- 
ness  in  a  phase  of  ruin  to  which  the  Great  War 
had  brought  all  Europe,  if  not  all  mankind.  The 
world  excited  them  both  in  the  same  way;  as  a 
crisis  in  which  they  were  called  upon  to  do  some- 
thing— they  did  not  yet  clearly  know  what.  Into 
this  topic  they  peered  as  into  some  deep  pool, 
side  by  side,  and  in  it  they  saw  each  other 
reflected. 

The  visit  to  Avebury  had  been  a  great  success. 
It  had  been  a  perfect  springtime  day,  and  the  little 
inn  had  been  delighted  at  the  reappearance  of  Sir 
Richmond's  car  so  soon  after  its  departure.  Its 
delight  was  particularly  manifest  in  the  cream  and 
salad  it  produced  for  lunch.  Both  Miss  Gram- 
mont  and  Miss  Seyffert  displayed  an  intelligent 
interest  in  their  food.  After  lunch  they  had  all 
gone  out  to  the  stones  and  the  wall.  Half  a  dozen 
sunburnt  children  were  putting  one  of  the  partially 
overturned  megaliths  to  a  happy  use  by  clamber- 
ing to  the  top  of  it  and  sliding  on  their  little  be- 
hinds  down  its  smooth  and  sloping  side  amidst 
much  mirthful  squealing. 

Sir  Richmond  and  Miss  Grammont  had  walked 
round  the  old  circumvallation  together,  but  Be- 
linda Seyffert  had  strayed  away  from  them,  pro- 
fessing an  interest  in  flowers.  It  was  not  so  much 
that  she  felt  they  had  to  be  left  together  that  made 
her  do  this  as  her  own  consciousness  of  being  pos- 
sessed by  a  devil  who  interrupted  conversations. 


COMPANIONSHIP  175 

When  Miss  Grammont  was  keenly  interested  in  a 
conversation,  then  Belinda  had  learnt  from  ex- 
perience that  it  was  wiser  to  go  off  with  her  devil 
out  of  the  range  of  any  temptation  to  interrupt. 

"You  really  think,"  said  Miss  Grammont,  "that 
it  would  be  possible  to  take  this  confused  old 
world  and  reshape  it,  set  it  marching  towards  that 
new  world  of  yours — of  two  hundred  and  fifty  mil- 
lion fully  developed,  beautiful  and  happy  people?" 

1 '  Why  not  ?  Nobody  is  doing  anything  with  the 
world  except  muddle  about.  Why  not  give  it  a 
direction  ? ' ' 

"You'd  take  it  in  your  hands  like  clay?" 

"Obdurate  clay  with  a  sort  of  recalcitrant,  un- 
intelligent life  of  its  own." 

Her  imagination  glowed  in  her  eyes  and  warmed 
her  voice.  "I  believe  what  you  say  is  possible. 
If  people  dare." 

"1  am  tired  of  following  little»motives  that  are 
like  flames  that  go  out  when  you  get  to  them.  I 
am  tired  of  seeing  all  the  world  doing  the  same. 
I  am  tired  of  a  world  in  which  there  is  nothing 
at  bul  gn-at  disasters.  Here  is  something  man- 
kind can  attempt,  that  we  can  attempt." 

"And  will.'" 

"1  believe  that  as  Mankind  grows  up  this  is  the 
business  Man  has  to  settle  down  to  and  will  settle 
down  to." 

Sin-  considered  that. 

"I've  been  getting  to  believe  something  like 


176    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

this.  But —  ...  it  frightens  me.  I  suppose  most 
of  us  have  this  same  sort  of  dread  of  taking  too 
much  upon  ourselves." 

1 '  So  we  just  live  like  pigs.  Sensible  little  piggy- 
wiggys.  I  've  got  a  Committee  full  of  that  sort  of 
thing.  We  live  like  little  modest  pigs.  And  let 
the  world  go  hang.  And  pride  ourselves  upon  our 
freedom  from  the  sin  of  presumption." 

"Not  quite  that!" 

' '  Well !    How  do  you  put  it  ? " 

1 '  We  are  afraid, ' '  she  said.  ' '  It 's  too  vast.  We 
want  bright  little  lives  of  our  own." 

"  Exactly — sensible  little  piggy-wiggy s. " 

"We  have  a  right  to  life — and  happiness." 

"First,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  "as  much  right 
as  a  pig  has  to  food.  But  whether  we  get  life  and 
happiness  or  fail  to  get  them  we  human  beings  who 
have  imaginations  want  something  more  nowa- 
days. ...  Of  course  we  want  bright  lives,  of 
course  we  want  happiness.  Just  as  we  want  food, 
just  as  we  want  sleep.  But  when  we  have  eaten, 
when  we  have  slept,  when  we  have  jolly  things 
about  us — it  is  nothing.  We  have  been  made  an 
exception  of — and  got  our  rations.  The  big 
thing  confronts  us  still.  It  is  vast,  I  agree,  but 
vast  as  it  is  it  is  the  thing  we  have  to  think 
about.  I  do  not  know  why  it  should  be  so,  but  I  am 
compelled  by  something  in  my  nature  to  want  to 
serve  this  idea  of  a  new  age  for  mankind.  I  want 
it  as  my  culminating  want.     I  want  a  world  in 


COMPANIONSHIP  177 

order,  a  disciplined  mankind  going  on  to  greater 
things.    Don't  you?" 

"Now  you  tell  me  of  it,"  she  said  with  a  smile, 
"I  do." 

"But  before f" 

"No.  You've  made  it  clear.  It  wasn't  clear 
before." 

"I've  been  talking  of  this  sort  of  thing  with 
my  friend  Dr.  Martineau.  And  I've  been  think- 
ing as  well  as  talking.  That  perhaps  is  why  I'm 
so  clear  and  positive." 

"I  don't  complain  that  you  are  clear  and  posi- 
tive. I've  been  coming  along  the  same  way.  .  .  . 
It's  refreshing  to  meet  you." 

"I  found  it  refreshing  to  meet  Martineau."  A 
twinge  of  conscience  about  Dr.  Martineau  turned 
Sir  Richmond  into  a  new  channel.  "He's  a  most 
interesting  man,"  he  said.  "Rather  shy  in  some 
I  pects.  Devoted  to  his  work.  And  he 's  writing 
a  book  which  has  saturated  him  in  these  ideas. 
Only  two  nights  ago  we  stood  here  and  talked 
about  it.  The  Psychology  of  a  New  Age.  The 
world,  he  believes,  is  entering  upon  a  new  phase 
in  its  history,  the  adolescence,  so  to  speak,  of  man- 
kind. It  is  an  idea  tliat  seizes  the  imagination. 
There  is  a  flow  of  new  ideas  abroad,  he  thinks, 
widening  realizations,  unprecedented  hopes  and 
fears.  Tin  re  is  a  eonsciousness  of  new  powers  and 
new  responsibilities.  We  are  sharing  the  adoles- 
cence of  our  race.    It  is  giving  history  a  new  and 


178         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

more  intimate  meaning  for  us.  It  is  bringing  us 
into  directer  relation  with  public  affairs, — making 
them  matter  as  formerly  they  didn't  seem  to  mat- 
ter. That  idea  of  the  bright  little  private  life 
has  to  go  by  the  board." 

"I  suppose  it  has,"  she  said,  meditatively,  as 
though  she  had  been  thinking  over  some  such  ques- 
tion before. 

''The  private  life,"  she  said,  "has  a  way  of 
coming  aboard  again." 

Her  reflections  travelled  fast  and  broke  out  now 
far  ahead  of  him. 

"You  have  some  sort  of  work  cut  out  for  you," 
she  said  abruptly. 

1 '  Yes.    Yes,  I  have. ' ' 

"I  haven't,"  she  said. 

1 '  So  that  I  go  about, ' '  she  added, ' '  like  someone 
who  is  looking  for  something.  I  'd  like  to  know — 
if  it's  not  jabbing  too  searching  a  question  at  you 
— what  you  have  found." 

Sir  Eichmond  considered.  "Incidentally,"  he 
smiled,  "I  want  to  get  a  lasso  over  the  neck  of 
that  very  forcible  and  barbaric  person,  your 
father.  I  am  doing  my  best  to  help  lay  the  foun- 
dation of  a  scientific  world  control  of  fuel  produc- 
tion and  distribution.  We  have  a  Fuel  Commis- 
sion in  London  with  rather  wide  powers  of  enquiry 
into  the  whole  world  problem  of  fuel.  We  shall 
come  out  to  Washington  presently  with  pro- 
posals." 


COMPANIONSHIP  179 

Miss  Grammont  surveyed  the  landscape.  "I 
suppose,"  she  said,  ''poor  father  is  rather  like  an 
unbroken  mule  in  business  affairs.  So  many  of 
our  big  business  men  in  America  are.  He'll  lash 
out  at  you. ' ' 

"I  don't  mind  if  only  he  lashes  out  openly  in  the 
sight  of  all  men." 

She  considered  and  turned  on  Sir  Kichmond 
gravely. 

' '  Tell  me  what  you  want  to  do  to  him.  You  find 
out  so  many  things  for  me  that  I  seem  to  have 
been  thinking  about  in  a  sort  of  almost  invisible 
half -conscious  way.  I've  been  suspecting  for  a 
long  time  that  Civilization  wasn't  much  good  un- 
less it  got  people  like  my  father  under  some  sort 
of  control.  But  controlling  father — as  distin- 
guished from  managing  him!"  She  reviewed 
some  private  and  amusing  memories.  "He  is  a 
most  intractable  man." 

They  had  gone  on  to  talk  of  her  father  and  of 
the  types  of  men  who  controlled  international 
business.  She  had  had  plentiful  opportunities  for 
observation  in  their  homes  and  her  own.  Gunter 
Lake,  the  big  banker,  she  knew  particularly  well, 
becauso,  it  seemed,  she  had  been  engaged  or  was 
engaged  to  marry  him.  "All  these  people,"  she 
said,  "are  pushing  things  about,  affecting  mil- 


180    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

lions  of  lives,  hurting  and  disordering  hundreds  of 
thousands  of  people.  They  don't  seem  to  know 
what  they  are  doing.  They  have  no  plans  in  par- 
ticular. .  .  .  And  you  are  getting  something  going 
that  will  be  a  plan  and  a  direction  and  a  conscience 
and  a  control  for  them?  You  will  find  my  father 
extremely  difficult,  but  some  of  our  younger  men 
would  love  it. 

"And,"  she  went  on;  "there  are  American 
women  who'd  love  it  too.  We're  petted.  We're 
kept  out  of  things.  We  aren't  placed.  We  don't 
get  enough  to  do.  We're  spenders  and  wasters 
— not  always  from  choice.  While  these  fathers 
and  brothers  and  husbands  of  ours  play  about 
with  the  fuel  and  power  and  life  and  hope  of  the 
world  as  though  it  was  a  game  of  poker.  With  all 
the  empty  unspeakable  solemnity  of  the  male. 
And  treat  us  as  though  we  ought  to  be  satisfied 
if  they  bring  home  part  of  the  winnings. 

"That  can't  go  on,"  she  said. 

Her  eyes  went  back  to  the  long,  low,  undulating 
skyline  of  the  downs.  She  spoke  as  though  she 
took  up  the  thread  of  some  controversy  that  had 
played  a  large  part  in  her  life.  "That  isn't  going 
on, ' '  she  said  with  an  effect  of  conclusive  decision. 

Sir  Richmond  recalled  that  little  speech  now  as 
he  returned  from  Salisbury  station  to  the  Old 
George  after  his  farewell  to  Martineau.  He  re- 
called too  the  soft  firmness  of  her  profile  and  the 
delicate  line  of  her  lifted  chin.    He  felt  that  this 


COMPANIONSHIP  181 

time  at  any  rate  he  was  not  being  deceived  by  the 
outward  shows  of  a  charming  human  being.  This 
young  woman  had  real  firmness  of  character  to 
back  up  her  free  and  independent  judgments.  He 
smiled  at  the  idea  of  any  facile  passion  in  the  com- 
position of  so  sure  and  gallant  a  personality. 
Martineau  was  very  fine-minded  in  many  respects, 
but  he  was  an  old  maid ;  and  like  all  old  maids  he 
saw  man  and  woman  in  every  encounter.  But  pas- 
sion was  a  thing  men  and  women  fell  back  upon 
when  they  had  nothing  else  in  common.  When 
they  thought  in  the  pleasantest  harmony  and 
every  remark  seemed  to  weave  a  fresh  thread 
of  common  interest,  then  it  wasn't  so  necessary. 
It  might  happen,  but  it  wasn't  so  necessary.  .  .  . 
If  it  did  it  would  be  a  secondary  thing  to  compan- 
ionship. ..  .  .  That's  what  she  was, — a  com- 
panion. 

But  a  very  lovely  and  wonderful  companion,  the 
companion  one  would  not  relinquish  until  the  very 
last  moment  one  could  keep  with  her. 

Her  views  about  America  and  about  her  own 
place  in  the  world  seemed  equally  fresh  and  orig- 
inal to  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  realize  I've  got  to  be  a  responsible  American 
citizen,"  she  had  said.  That  didn't  mean  that 
she  attached  very  much  importance  to  her  re- 
cently acquired  vote.  She  evidently  classified 
voters  into  the  irresponsible  who  just  had  votes 
and  the  responsible  who  also  had  a  considerable 


182        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

amount  of  property  as  well.  She  had  no  illusions 
about  the  power  of  the  former  class.  It  didn't 
exist.  They  were  steered  to  their  decisions  by 
people  employed,  directed  or  stimulated  by 
''father"  and  his  friends  and  associates,  the 
owners  of  America,  the  real  "  responsible  citi- 
zens." Or  they  fell  a  prey  to  the  merely  adven- 
turous leading  of  ' '  revolutionaries. ' '  But  anyhow 
they  were  steered.  She  herself,  it  was  clear, 
was  bound  to  become  a  very  responsible  citizen 
indeed.  She  would  some  day,  she  laughed,  be 
"swimming  in  oil  and  suchlike  property."  Her 
interest  in  Sir  Richmond's  schemes  for  a  scien- 
tific world  management  of  fuel  was  therefore,  she 
realized,  a  very  direct  one.  But  it  was  remark- 
able to  find  a  young  woman  seeing  it  like  that. 

Father  it  seemed  varied  very  much  in  his  atti' 
tude  towards  her.  He  despised  and  distrusted 
women  generally,  and  it  was  evident  he  had  made 
it  quite  clear  to  her  how  grave  an  error  it  was  on 
her  part  to  persist  in  being  a  daughter  and  not 
a  son.  At  moments  it  seemed  to  Sir  Richmond 
that  she  was  disposed  to  agree  with  father  upon 
that.  When  Mr.  Grammont's  sense  of  her  regretta- 
ble femininity  was  uppermost,  then  he  gave  his 
intelligence  chiefly  to  schemes  for  tying  her  up 
against  the  machinations  of  adventurers  by  means 
of  trustees,  partners,  lawyers,  advisers,  agree- 
ments and  suchlike  complications,  or  for  acquir- 
ing a  workable  son  by  marriage.    To  this  last  idea 


COMPANIONSHIP  183 

it  would  seem  the  importance  in  her  life  of  the 
rather  heavily  named  Gunter  Lake  was  to  be  as- 
cribed. But  another  mood  of  the  old  man's  was 
distrust  of  anything  that  could  not  be  spoken  of  as 
his  "own  flesh  and  blood,"  and  then  he  would  di- 
rect his  attention  to  a  kind  of  masculinization  of 
his  daughter  and  to  schemes  for  giving  her  the 
completest  control  of  all  he  had  to  leave  her  pro- 
vided she  never  married  nor  fell  under  masculine 
sway.  "After  all, ' '  he  would  reflect  as  he  hesitated 
over  the  practicability  of  his  life's  ideal,  "there 
was  Hetty  Green." 

This  latter  idea  had  reft  her  suddenly  at  the 
age  of  seventeen  from  the  educational  care  of  an 
English  gentlewoman  warranted  to  fit  her  for 
marriage  with  any  prince  in  Europe,  and  thrust 
her  for  the  mornings  and  a  moiety  of  the  after- 
noons of  the  better  part  of  a  year,  after  a  swift 
but  competent  training,  into  a  shirt  waist  and  an 
office  down  town.  She  had  been  entrusted  at  first 
to  a  harvester  concern  independent  of  Mr.  Gram- 
mont,  because  he  feared  bis  own  people  wouldn't 
train  her  hard.  She  had  worked  for  ordinary 
wages  and  ordinary  hours,  and  at  the  end  of  the 
day,  she  mentioned  casually,  a  large  automobile 
with  two  menservanta  and  a  trustworthy  secre- 
tary used  to  pick  her  onl  from  the  torrent  of  un- 
distingoished  workers  thai  poured  ont  of  the 
Synoptical  Building.  This  masculinization  idea 
had  also  sent  her  on  n  commission  of  enquiry  into 


184        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Mexico.  There  apparently  she  had  really  done 
responsible  work. 

But  upon  the  question  of  labour  Mr.  Grammont 
was  fierce,  even  for  an  American  business  man, 
and  one  night  at  a  dinner  party  he  discovered  his 
daughter  displaying  what  he  considered  an  im- 
proper familiarity  with  socialist  ideas.  This  had 
produced  a  violent  revulsion  towards  the  purdah 
system  and  the  idea  of  a  matrimonial  alliance  with 
Gunter  Lake.  Gunter  Lake,  Sir  Richmond  gath- 
ered, wasn't  half  a  bad  fellow.  Generally  it  would 
seem  Miss  Grammont  liked  him,  and  she  had  a 
way  of  speaking  about  him  that  suggested  that 
in  some  way  Mr.  Lake  had  been  rather  hardly 
used  and  had  acquired  merit  by  his  behaviour 
under  bad  treatment.  There  was  some  story,  how- 
ever, connected  with  her  war  services  in  Europe 
upon  which  Miss  Grammont  was  evidently  indis- 
posed to  dwell.  About  that  story  Sir  Richmond 
was  left  at  the  end  of  his  Avebury  day  and  after 
his  last  talk  with  Dr.  Martineau,  still  quite 
vaguely  guessing. 

So  much  fact  about  Miss  Grammont  as  we  have 
given  had  floated  up  in  fragments  and  pieced  it- 
self together  in  Sir  Richmond's  mind  in  the  course 
of  a  day  and  a  half.  The  fragments  came  up  as 
allusions  or  by  way  of  illustration.  The  sustain- 
ing topic  was  this  New  Age  Sir  Richmond  fore- 
shadowed, this  world  under  scientific  control,  the 
Utopia  of  fully  developed  people  fully  developing 


COMPANIONSHIP  185 

the  resources  of  the  earth.  For  a  number  of  triv- 
ial reasons  Sir  Richmond  found  himself  ascribing 
the  project  of  this  New  Age  almost  wholly  to  Dr. 
Martineau,  and  presenting  it  as  a  much  completer 
scheme  than  he  was  justified  in  doing.  It  was  true 
that  Dr.  Martineau  had  not  said  many  of  the 
things  Sir  Richmond  ascribed  to  him,  but  also  it 
was  true  that  they  had  not  crystallized  out  in  Sir 
Richmond's  mind  before  his  talks  with  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau. The  idea  of  a  New  Age  necessarily  carries 
with  it  the  idea  of  fresh  rules  of  conduct  and  of 
different  relationships  between  human  beings. 
And  it  throws  those  who  talk  about  it  into  the 
companionship  of  a  common  enterprise.  To-mor- 
row the  New  Age  will  be  here  no  doubt,  but  to- 
day it  is  the  hope  and  adventure  of  only  a  few 
human  beings. 

So  that  it  was  natural  for  Miss  Grammont  and 
Sir  Richmond  to  ask:  "What  are  we  to  do  with 
such  types  as  father?"  and  to  fall  into  an  idiom 
that  assumed  a  joint  enterprise.  They  had 
agreed  by  a  tacit  consent  to  a  common  conception 
of  the  world  they  desired  as  a  world  scientifically 
ordered,  an  immense  organization  of  mature  com 
monsense,  healthy  and  secure,  gathering  knowl- 
edge and  power  for  creative  adventures  as  yet 
beyond  dreaming.    They  were  prepared  to  think 

of  the  makers  of  the  Avebury  dyke,  as  their  yes- 
terday selves,  o£  the  stone  age  savages  as  a 

phase   in   their   Late  childhood,  and  of   this  grval 


186        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

world  order  Sir  Richmond  foresaw  as  a  day  where 
dawn  was  already  at  hand.  And  in  such  long  per- 
spectives, the  states,  governments  and  institu- 
tions of  to-day  became  very  temporary-looking 
and  replaceable  structures  indeed.  Both  these 
two  people  found  themselves  thinking  in  this  fash- 
ion with  an  unwonted  courage  and  freedom  be- 
cause the  other  one  had  been  disposed  to  think 
in  this  fashion  before.  Sir  Richmond  was  still 
turning  over  in  his  mind  the  happy  mutual  re- 
lease of  the  imagination  this  chance  companion- 
ship had  brought  about  when  he  found  himself 
back  again  at  the  threshold  of  the  Old  George. 

M 

Sir  Richmond  Hardy  was  not  the  only  man  who 
was  thinking  intently  about  Miss  Grammont  at 
that  particular  moment.  Two  gentlemen  were 
coming  towards  her  across  the  Atlantic  whose 
minds,  it  chanced,  were  very  busily  occupied  by 
her  affairs.  One  of  these  was  her  father,  who  was 
lying  in  his  brass  bed  in  his  commodious  cabin  on 
the  Hollandia,  regretting  his  diminishing  ability 
to  sleep  in  the  early  morning  now,  even  when  he 
was  in  the  strong  and  soothing  air  of  mid- Atlantic, 
and  thinking  of  V.V.  because  she  had  a  way  of 
coming  into  his  mind  when  it  was  undefended ;  and 
the  other  was  Mr.  Gunter  Lake  on  the  Megantic, 
one  day  out  from  Sandy  Hook,  who  found  himself 


COMPANIONSHIP  187 

equally  sleepless  and  preoccupied.  And  although 
Mr.  Lake  was  a  man  of  vast  activities  and  com- 
plicated engagements  he  was  coming  now  to 
Europe  for  the  express  purpose  of  seeing  V.V. 
and  having  things  out  with  her  fully  and  com- 
pletely because,  in  spite  of  all  that  had  happened, 
she  made  such  an  endless  series  of  delays  in 
coming  to  America. 

Old  Grammont  as  he  appeared  upon  the  pillow 
of  his  bed  by  the  light  of  a  rose-shaded  bedside 
lamp,  was  a  small-headed,  grey-haired  gentleman 
with  a  wrinkled  face  and  sunken  brown  eyes. 
Years  of  business  experience,  mitigated  only  by 
such  exercise  as  the  game  of  poker  affords,  had 
intensified  an  instinctive  inexpressiveness.  Under 
the  most  solitary  circumstances  old  Grammont 
was  still  inexpressive,  and  the  face  that  stared  at 
the  ceiling  of  his  cabin  and  the  problem  of  his 
daughter  might  have  been  the  face  of  a  pickled 
bead  in  a  museum,  for  any  indication  it  betrayed 
of  the  flow  of  thought  within.  He  lay  on  his  back 
and  bis  bent  knees  lilted  the  bed-clothes  into  a 
sharp  mountain.  lie  was  not  even  trying  to 
sleep. 

Why,  he  meditated,  had  V.V.  stayed  on  in  Eu- 
rope so  much  longer  than   she  need  have  done? 
And  why  bad  Ghinter  Lake  suddenly  got  into  a 
state  of  mind  about  her?   Whydidn'l  the  girl  eon 
fide  in  her  father  al   Leasl   about  these  things? 

What    was   afoot?      She   had    thrown    over    Lake 


188        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

once  and  it  seemed  she  was  going  to  turn  him 
down  again.  Well,  if  she  was  an  ordinary  female 
person  that  was  a  silly  sort  of  thing  to  do.  With 
her  fortune  and  his — you  could  buy  the  world. 
But  suppose  she  was  not  an  ordinary  female  per- 
son. .  .  .  Her  mother  hadn't  been  ordinary  any- 
how, whatever  else  you  called  her,  and  no  one 
could  call  Grammont  blood  an  ordinary  fluid.  .  .  . 
Old  Grammont  had  never  had  any  delusions  about 
Lake.  If  Lake's  father  hadn't  been  a  big  man 
Lake  would  never  have  counted  for  anything  at 
all.  Suppose  she  did  turn  him  down.  In  itself 
that  wasn't  a  thing  to  break  her  father's  heart. 

What  did  matter  was  not  whether  she  threw 
Lake  over  but  what  she  threw  him  over  for.  If 
it  was  because  he  wasn't  man  enough,  well  and 
good.  But  if  it  was  for  some  other  lover,  some 
good-looking,  worthless  impostor,  some  European 
title  or  suchlike  folly ! 

At  the  thought  of  a  lover  for  V.V.  a  sudden 
flood  of  anger  poured  across  the  old  man's  mind, 
behind  the  still  mask  of  his  face.  It  infuriated 
him  even  to  think  of  V.V.,  his  little  V.V.,  his  own 
girl,  entertaining  a  lover,  being  possibly — most 
shameful  thought — in  love!  Like  some  ordinary 
silly  female,  sinking  to  kisses,  to  the  deeds  one 
could  buy  and  pay  for.  His  V.V. !  The  idea  in- 
furiated and  disgusted  him.  He  fought  against 
it  as  a  possibility.  Once  some  woman  in  New 
York  had  ventured  to  hint  something  to  him  of 


COMPANIONSHIP  189 

some  fellow,  some  affair  with  an  artist,  Caston; 
she  had  linked  this  Caston  with  V.V.'s  red  cross 
nursing  in  Europe.  .  .  .  Old  Grammont  had  made 
that  woman  sorry  she  spoke.  Afterwards  he 
had  caused  enquiries  to  be  made  about  this  Cas- 
ton, careful  enquiries.  It  seems  that  he  and  V.V. 
had  known  each  other,  there  had  been  something 

But  nothing  that  V.V.  need  be  ashamed  of. 

When  old  Grammont 's  enquiry  man  had  come 
back  with  his  report,  old  Grammont  had  been 
very  particular  about  that.  At  first  the  fellow 
had  not  been  very  clear,  rather  muddled  indeed 
as  to  how  tilings  were — no  doubt  he  had  wanted 
to  make  out  there  was  something  just  to  seem  to 
earn  his  money.  Old  Grammont  had  struck  the 
table  sharply  and  the  eyes  that  looked  out  of  his 
mask  had  blazed.  "What  have  you  found  out 
against  her?"  he  had  asked  in  a  low  even  voice. 
"Absolutely  nothing,  Sir,"  said  the  agent,  sud- 
denly white  to  the  lips.  .  .  . 

Old  Grammoni  stared  a1  his  memory  of  that 
moment  for  a  while.  Thai  affair  was  all  right, 
quite  all  right.  Of  course  it  was  all  right.  And 
also,  happily,  Caston  was  among  the  <l<\'i<].  Bui 
it  was  well  her  broken  engagement  with  Lake  had 
been  resumed  as  though  it  h;nl  aever  been  broken 
off.  It'  there  had  been  any  tnlk  thai  Pad  an- 
swered it.  And  now  thai  Lake  had  served  his 
purpose  old  Grammoni  did  aol  care  in  the  least 
if  he  was  shrived.    V.V.  eould  stand  alone. 


190        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Old  Grarnmont  had  got  a  phrase  in  his  mind 
that  looked  like  dominating  the  situation.  He 
dreamt  of  saying  to  V.V. :  "V.V.,  I'm  going  to 
make  a  man  of  you — if  you're  man  enough." 
That  was  a  large  proposition ;  it  implied — oh !  it 
implied  all  sorts  of  things.  It  meant  that  she 
would  care  as  little  for  philandering  as  an  able 
young  business  man.  Perhaps  some  day,  a  long 
time  ahead,  she  might  marry.  There  wasn't  much 
reason  for  it,  but  it  might  be  she  would  not  wish  to 
be  called  a  spinster.  "Take  a  husband,"  thought 
old  Grammont,  "when  I  am  gone,  as  one  takes  a 
butler,  to  make  the  household  complete."  In  pre- 
vious meditations  on  his  daughter's  outlook  old 
Grammont  had  found  much  that  was  very  sug- 
gestive in  the  precedent  of  Queen  Victoria.  She 
had  had  no  husband  of  the  lord  and  master  type, 
so  to  speak,  but  only  a  Prince  Consort,  well  in 
hand.  Why  shouldn  't  the  Grammont  heiress  dom- 
inate her  male  belonging,  if  it  came  to  that,  in  the 
same  fashion?  Why  shouldn't  one  tie  her  up 
and  tie  the  whole  thing  up,  so  far  as  any  male 
belonging  was  concerned,  leaving  V.V.  in  all  other 
respects  free?    How  could  one  do  it ? 

The  speculative  calm  of  the  sunken  brown  eyes 
deepened. 

His  thoughts  went  back  to  the  white  face  of 
the  private  enquiry  agent.  "Absolutely  nothing, 
Sir."  What  had  the  fellow  thought  of  hinting? 
Nothing  of  that  kind  in  V.V.'s  composition, — 


COMPANIONSHIP  191 

never  fear.  Yet  it  was  a  curious  anomaly  that 
while  one  had  a  thousand  ways  of  defending  one 's 
daughter  and  one's  property  against  that  daugh- 
ter's husband,  there  was  no  power  on  earth  by 
which  a  father  could  stretch  his  dead  hand  between 
that  daughter  and  the  undue  influence  of  a  lover. 
Unless  you  tied  her  up  for  good  and  all,  lover  or 
none.  .  .  . 

One  was  left  at   the  mercy  of  V.V.'s  char- 

clCIv'I  .      •     •     • 

''I  ought  to  see  more  of  her,"  he  thought. 
"She  gets  away  from  me.  Just  as  her  mother 
did."  A  man  need  not  suspect  his  womenkind  but 
he  should  know  what  they  are  doing.  It  is  duty, 
his  protective  duty  to  them.  These  companions, 
these  Seyffert  women  and  so  forth,  were  all  very 
well  in  their  way;  there  wasn't  much  they  kept 
from  you  if  you  got  them  cornered  and  asked  them 
intently.  But  a  father's  eye  is  better.  He  must 
go  about  with  the  girl  for  a  time,  watch  her  with 
other  men,  give  her  chances  to  talk  business  with 
him  and  see  if  she  took  them.  "V.V.,  I'm  going 
to  make  a  man  of  you,"  the  phrase  ran  through 
his  brain.  The  deep  instinctive  jealousy  of  the 
primordial  father  was  still  strong  in  old  Gram 
mont's  Mood.  It  would  be  pleasant  to  go  about 
with  her  on  his  right  hand  in  Paris,  his  girl, 
straight  and  lovely,  desirable  and  unapproachable, 
— above  that  sort  of  nonsense,  above  all  other  mas- 
culine subjugation. 


192    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"V.V.,  I'm  going  to  make  a  man  of  you.  ..." 
His  mind  grew  calmer.    Whatever  she  wanted 

in  Paris  should  be  hers.    He'd  just  let  her  rip. 

They'd  be  like  sweethearts  together,  he  and  his 

girl. 
Old  Grammont  dozed  off  into  dreamland. 


§5 

The  imaginations  of  Mr.  Gunter  Lake,  two  days 
behind  Mr.  Grammont  upon  the  Atlantic,  were  of 
a  gentler,  more  romantic  character.  In  them 
V.V.  was  no  longer  a  daughter  in  the  fierce  focus 
of  a  father's  jealousy,  but  the  goddess  enshrined 
in  a  good  man's  heart.  Indeed  the  figure  that  the 
limelight  of  the  reverie  fell  upon  was  not  V.V. 
at  all  but  Mr.  Gunter  Lake  himself,  in  his  fav- 
ourite role  of  the  perfect  lover. 

An  interminable  speech  unfolded  itself.  "I  ask 
for  nothing  in  return.  I've  never  worried  you 
about  that  Caston  business  and  I  never  will.  Mar- 
ried to  me  you  shall  be  as  free  as  if  you  were  un- 
married. Don't  I  know,  my  dear  girl,  that  you 
don't  love  me  yet.  Let  that  be  as  you  wish.  I  want 
nothing  you  are  not  willing  to  give  me,  nothing  at 
all.  All  I  ask  is  the  privilege  of  making  life 
happy — and  it  shall  be  happy — for  you.  .  .  .  All 
I  ask.  .  .  .  All  I  ask.  .  .  ..  Protect,  guard, 
<  licrish.  ..." 


COMPANIONSHIP  193 

For  to  Mr.  Gunter  Lake  it  seemed  there  could 
be  no  lovelier  thing  in  life  than  a  wife  ''in  name 
only"  slowly  warmed  into  a  glow  of  passion  by 
the  steadfast  devotion  and  the  strength  and  wis- 
dom of  a  mate  at  first  despised.  Until  at  last  a 
day  would  come.  .  .  . 

"My  darling!"  Mr.  Gunter  Lake  whispered  to 
the  darkness.  ' '  My  little  guurl.  It  has  been  worth 
the  waiting.  ..." 

§6 

Miss  Grammont  met  Sir  Richmond  in  the  bur- 
eau of  the  Old  George  with  a  telegram  in  her 
haud.  ' '  My  father  reported  his  latitude  and  longi- 
tude by  wireless  last  night.  The  London  people 
think  he  will  be  off  Falmouth  in  four  days'  time. 
He  wants  me  to  join  his  liner  there  and  go  on  to 
Cherbourg  and  Paris.  He's  arranged  that. 
He's  the  sort  of  man  who  can  arrange  things  like 
that.  There'll  be  someone  at  Falmouth  to  look 
after  us  and  put  us  aboard  the  liner.  I  must  wire 
them  where  I  can  pick  up  a  telegram  to-morrow." 

"Wells  in  Somerset,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

His  plans  were  already  quite  clear.  He  ex- 
plained thai  he  wanted  her  first  to  see  Shaftes- 
bury, a  little  old  Wessex  town  that  was  three  or 
four  hundred  years  older  than  Salisbury,  perched 
<»n  a  hill,  a  Saxon  town,  where  Alfred  had  gathered 
his  forces  against  the   Danes  and  where  Canute, 


194        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

who  had  ruled  over  all  Scandinavia  and  Iceland 
and  Greenland,  and  had  come  near  ruling  a  patch 
of  America,  had  died.  It  was  a  little  sleepy  place 
now,  looking  out  dreamily  over  beautiful  views. 
They  would  lunch  in  Shaftesbury  and  walk  round 
it.  Then  they  would  go  in  the  afternoon  through 
the  pleasant  west  country  where  the  Celts  had  pre- 
vailed against  the  old  folk  of  the  Stonehenge  tem- 
ple and  the  Romans  against  the  Celts  and  the 
Saxons  against  the  Romanized  Britons  and  the 
Danes  against  the  Saxons,  a  war-scarred  land- 
scape, abounding  in  dykes  and  entrenchments  and 
castles,  sunken  now  into  the  deepest  peace,  to 
Glastonbury  to  see  what  there  was  to  see  of  a 
marsh  village  the  Celts  had  made  for  themselves 
three  or  four  hundred  years  before  the  Romans 
came.  And  at  Glastonbury  also  there  were  the 
ruins  of  a  great  Benedictine  church  and  abbey 
that  had  once  rivalled  Salisbury.  Thence  they 
would  go  on  to  Wells  to  see  yet  another  great 
cathedral  and  to  dine  and  sleep.  Glastonbury 
Abbey  and  Wells  Cathedral  brought  the  story  of 
Europe  right  up  to  Reformation  times. 

"That  will  be  a  good  day  for  us,"  said  Sir 
Richmond.  "It  will  be  like  turning  over  the  pages 
of  the  history  of  our  family,  to  and  fro.  There 
will  be  nothing  nearly  so  old  as  Avebury  in  it, 
but  there  will  be  something  from  almost  every 
chapter  that  comes  after  Stonehenge.  Rome  will 
be  poorly  represented,  but  that  may  come  the  day 


COMPANIONSHIP  195 

after  at  Bath.  And  the  next  day  too  I  want  to 
show  you  something  of  our  old  River  Severn. 
We  will  come  right  up  to  the  present  if  we  go 
through  Bristol.  There  we  shall  have  a  whiff  of 
America,  our  new  find,  from  which  the  tobacco 
comes,  and  we  shall  be  reminded  of  how  we  set 
sail  thither — was  it  yesterday  or  the  day  before? 
You  will  understand  at  Bristol  how  it  is  that  the 
energy  has  gone  out  of  this  dreaming  land — to 
Africa  and  America  and  the  whole  wide  world.  It 
was  the  good  men  of  Bristol,  by  the  bye,  with 
their  trade  from  Africa  to  America,  who  gave  you 
your  colour  problem.  Bristol  we  may  go  through 
to-morrow  and  Gloucester,  mother  of  I  don't  know 
how  many  American  Gloucesters.  Bath  we'll  get 
in  somehow.  And  then  as  an  Anglo-American 
showman  I  shall  be  tempted  to  run  you  northward 
a  little  way  past  Tewkesbury,  just  to  go  into  a 
church  here  and  there  and  show  you  monuments 
bearing  little  shields  with  the  stars  and  stripes 
upon  them,  a  few  stars  and  a  few  stripes,  the 
Washington  family  monuments." 

"It  was  not  only  from  England  that  America 
came,"  said  Miss  Grammont. 

"Bui  England  takes  an  American  memory  back 
most  easily  and  most  fully    to  Avebury  and  the 

Baltic  Northmen,  past  the  emperors  and  the  Cor- 
inthian columns  thai   smothered    Latin    Europe. 

.   .  .      For  yon   and   me  anyhow    I  his   is  our   past, 

this  was  our  childhood,  and  this  is  our  land." 


196         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

He  interrupted  laughing  as  she  was  about  to 
reply.  "Well,  anyhow,"  he  said,  "it  is  a  beauti- 
ful day  and  a  pretty  country  before  us  with  the 
ripest  history  in  every  grain  of  its  soil.  So  we'll 
send  a  wire  to  your  London  people  and  tell  them 
to  send  their  instructions  to  "Wells." 

"I'll  tell  Belinda,"  she  said,  "to  be  quick  with 
her  packing." 

§7 

As  Miss  Grammont  and  Sir  Richmond  Hardy 
fulfilled  the  details  of  his  excellent  programme  and 
revised  their  impressions  of  the  past  and  their 
ideas  about  the  future  in  the  springtime  sunlight 
of  Wiltshire  and  Somerset,  with  Miss  Seyffert  act- 
ing the  part  of  an  almost  ostentatiously  discreet 
chorus,  it  was  inevitable  that  their  conversation 
should  become,  by  imperceptible  gradations, 
more  personal  and  intimate.  They  kept  up  the 
pose,  which  was  supposed  to  represent  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau's  philosophy,  of  being  Man  and  Woman  on 
their  Planet  considering  its  Future,  but  insensi- 
bly they  developed  the  idiosyncrasies  of  their  posi- 
tion. They  might  profess  to  be  Man  and  Woman 
in  the  most  general  terms,  but  the  facts  that  she 
was  the  daughter  not  of  Everyman  but  old  Gram- 
mont and  that  Sir  Richmond  was  the  angry 
leader  of  a  minority  upon  the  Fuel  Commission 
became  more  and  more  important.    "What  shall 


COMPANIONSHIP  197 

we  do  with  this  planet  of  ours?"  gave  way  by 
the  easiest  transitions  to  "What  are  you  and  I 
doing  and  what  have  we  got  to  do?  How  do  you 
feel  about  it  all?  What  do  you  desire  and  what 
do  you  dare  ? ' ' 

It  was  natural  that  Sir  Richmond  should  talk 
of  his  Fuel  Commission  to  a  young  woman  whose 
interests  in  fuel  were  even  greater  than  his  own. 
He  found  that  she  was  very  much  better  read  than 
he  was  in  the  recent  literature  of  socialism,  and 
that  she  had  what  he  considered  to  be  a  most 
unfeminine  grasp  of  economic  ideas.  He  thought 
her  attitude  towards  socialism  a  very  sane  one 
because  it  was  also  his  own.  So  far  as  socialism 
involved  the  idea  of  a  scientific  control  of  natural 
resources  as  a  common  property  administered  in 
the  common  interest,  she  and  he  were  very  greatly 
attracted  by  it;  but  so  far  as  it  served  as  a  form 
of  expression  for  the  merely  insubordinate  dis- 
content of  the  many  with  the  few,  under  any  con- 
ditions, bo  long  as  it  was  a  formula  for  class  jeal- 
ousy and  warfare,  they  were  both  repelled  by  it. 
If  she  had  had  any  illusions  about  the  working 
class  poi  jesi  ing  as  a  class  any  profounder  polit- 
ical wisdom  or  more  generous  public  Impulses 
than  any  other  elnss,  those  illusions  had  long  since 
departed.  People  were  much  the  same,  she 
thought,  in  every  class  ;  there  was  no  stratification 
of  either  Tightness  or  righteousness. 

He  found  he  could  talk  to  her  of  his  work  and 


198        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

aims  upon  the  Fuel  Commission  and  of  the  con- 
flict and  failure  of  motives  he  found  in  himself, 
as  freely  as  he  had  done  to  Dr.  Martineau  and 
with  a  surer  confidence  of  understanding.  Per- 
haps his  talks  with  the  doctor  had  got  his  ideas 
into  order  and  made  them  more  readily  expressi- 
ble than  they  would  have  been  otherwise.  He 
argued  against  the  belief  that  any  class  could  be 
good  as  a  class  or  bad  as  a  class,  and  he  instanced 
the  conflict  of  motives  he  found  in  all  the  mem- 
bers of  his  Committee  and  most  so  in  himself.  He 
repeated  the  persuasion  he  had  already  confessed 
to  Dr.  Martineau  that  there  was  not  a  single 
member  of  the  Fuel  Commission  but  had  a  consid- 
erable drive  towards  doing  the  right  thing  about 
fuel,  and  not  one  who  had  a  single-minded,  unen- 
cumbered drive  towards  the  right  thing.  "That," 
said  Sir  Richmond,  "is  what  makes  life  so  inter- 
esting and,  in  spite  of  a  thousand  tragic  disap- 
pointments, so  hopeful.  Every  man  is  a  bad  man, 
every  man  is  a  feeble  man  and  every  man  is  a 
good  man.  My  motives  come  and  go.  Yours  do 
the  same.  "We  vary  in  response  to  the  circum- 
stances about  us.  Given  a  proper  atmosphere, 
most  men  will  be  public-spirited,  right-living,  gen- 
erous. Given  perplexities  and  darkness,  most  of 
us  can  be  cowardly  and  vile.  People  say  you  can- 
not change  human  nature  and  perhaps  that  is  true, 
but  you  can  change  its  responses  endlessly.  The 
other  day  I  was  in  Bohemia,  discussing  Silesian 


COMPANIONSHIP  199 

coal  with  Benes,  and  I  went  to  see  the  Festival  of 
the  Bohemian  Sokols.  Opposite  to  where  I  sat, 
far  away  across  the  arena,  was  a  great  bank  of 
men  of  the  Sokol  organizations,  an  unbroken 
brown  mass  wrapped  in  their  brown  uniform 
cloaks.  Suddenly  the  sun  came  out  and  at  a 
word  the  whole  body  flung  back  their  cloaks, 
showed  their  Garibaldi  shirts  and  became  one 
solid  blaze  of  red.  It  was  an  amazing  transforma- 
tion until  one  understood  what  had  happened. 
Yet  nothing  material  had  changed — but  the  sun- 
shine. And  given  a  change  in  laws  and  prevailing 
ideas,  and  the  very  same  people  who  are  greedy 
traders,  grasping  owners  and  revolting  workers 
to-day  will  all  throw  their  cloaks  aside  and  you 
will  find  them  working  together  cheerfully,  even 
generously,  for  a  common  end.  They  aren't  trad- 
ers and  owners  and  workers  and  so  forth  by  any 
inner  necessity.  Those  are  just  the  ugly  parts 
they  play  in  the  present  drama.  Which  is  nearly 
at  the  end  of  its  run." 

"That's  a  hopeful  view,"  said  Miss  (Jranmiont. 
"I  don't  see  the  flaw  in  it — if  there  is  a  (law." 

"There  isn't  one,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "It  is 
my  chief  discovery  about  life.  1  began  with  the 
question  of  fuel  and  the  energy  il  affords  man- 
kind, and  I  have  found  thai  my  generalization  ap- 
plies to  all  human  affairs.  Human  beings  are 
fools,  weaklings,  cowards,  passionate  idiots, — I 
grant  you.    That  is  the  brown  cloak  side  <>f  them, 


200         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

so  to  speak.  But  they  are  not  such  fools  and  so 
forth  that  they  can't  do  pretty  well  materially  if 
once  we  hammer  out  a  sane  collective  method  of 
getting  and  using  fuel.  Which  people  generally 
will  understand — in  the  place  of  our  present 
methods  of  snatch  and  wrangle.  Of  that  I  am  ab- 
solutely convinced.  Some  work,  some  help,  some 
willingness  you  can  get  out  of  everybody.  That's 
the  red.  And  the  same  principle  applies  to  most 
labour  and  property  problems,  to  health,  to  educa- 
tion, to  population,  social  relationships  and  war 
and  peace.  We  haven't  got  the  right  system,  we 
have  inefficient  half-baked  systems,  or  no  system 
at  all,  and  a  wild  confusion  and  war  of  ideas  in 
all  these  respects.  But  there  is  a  right  system 
possible  none  the  less.  Let  us  only  hammer  our 
way  through  to  the  sane  and  reasonable  organiza- 
tion in  this  and  that  and  the  other  human  affairs, 
and  once  we  have  got  it,  we  shall  have  got  it 
for  good.  We  may  not  live  to  see  even  the  be- 
ginnings of  success,  but  the  spirit  of  order,  the 
spirit  that  has  already  produced  organized 
science,  if  only  there  are  a  few  faithful,  persist- 
ent people  to  stick  to  the  job,  will  in  the  long  run 
certainly  save  mankind  and  make  human  life — 
clean  and  splendid,  happy  work  in  a  clear  mind. 
If  I  could  live  to  see  it ! " 

"And  as  for  us — in  our  time?" 

"Measured  by  the  end  we  serve,  we  don't  mat- 
ter.   You  know  we  don't  matter." 


COMPANIONSHIP  201 

"We  have  to  find  our  fun  in  the  building  and 
in  our  confidence  that  we  do  really  build." 

"So  long  as  our  confidence  lasts  there  is  no 
great  hardship, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"So  long  as  our  confidence  lasts,"  she  repeated 
after  him. 

'  <  Ah ! "  cried  Sir  Richmond.  ' *  There  it  is !  So 
long  as  our  confidence  lasts !  So  long  as  one  keeps 
one's  mind  steady.  That  is  what  I  came  away 
with  Dr.  Martineau  to  discuss.  I  went  to  him  for 
advice.  I  haven't  known  him  for  more  than  a 
month.  It's  amusing  to  find  myself  preaching 
forth  to  you.  It  was  just  faith  I  had  lost.  Sud- 
denly I  had  lost  my  power  of  work.  My  confi- 
dence in  the  Tightness  of  what  I  was  doing  evap- 
orated. My  will  failed  me.  I  don't  know  if  you 
will  understand  what  that  means.  It  wasn't  that 
my  reason  didn't  assure  me  just  as  certainly  as 
ever  that  what  I  was  trying  to  do  was  the  right 
thing  to  try  to  do.  But  somehow  that  seemed  a 
cold  and  personally  unimportant  proposition. 
The  life  had  gone  out  of  it.  .  .  ." 

He  paused  as  if  arrested  by  ;i  momentary  doubt. 
"I  don't  know  why  I  tell  you  these  things,"  he 

Baid. 

"You  tell  them  me,"  slie  s;ii<l. 
"It's  ;i  little  like  a  patient  in  ;i  hydropath  re- 
tailing his  ailments." 
"No.    Xo.    Goon." 
"I  began  to  think  now  that  what  took  the  go 


202        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

out  of  me  as  my  work  went  on  was  the  lack  of  any 
real  fellowship  in  what  I  was  doing.  It  was  the 
pressure  of  the  opposition  in  the  Committee,  day 
after  day.  It  was  being  up  against  men  who  didn't 
reason  against  me  but  who  just  showed  by  every- 
thing they  did  that  the  things  I  wanted  to  achieve 
didn't  matter  to  them  one  rap.  It  was  going  back 
to  a  home,  lunching  in  clubs,  reading  papers,  going 
about  a  world  in  which  all  the  organization,  all 
the  possibility  of  the  organization  I  dream  of  is 
tacitly  denied.  I  don't  know  if  it  seems  an  ex- 
traordinary confession  of  weakness  to  you,  but 
that  steady  refusal  of  the  majority  of  my  Com- 
mittee to  come  into  co-operation  with  me  has 
beaten  me — or  at  any  rate  has  come  very  near  to 
beating  me.  Most  of  them  you  know  are  such 
able  men.  You  can  feel  their  knowledge  and  com- 
monsense.  They,  and  everybody  about  me, 
seemed  busy  and  intent  upon  more  immediate 
things,  that  seemed  more  real  to  them  than  this 
remote,  theoretical,  priggish  end  I  have  set  for 
myself.  ..." 

He  paused. 

4 'Go  on,"  said  Miss  Grammont.  "I  think  I 
understand  this." 

"And  yet  I  know  I  am  right." 

"I  know  you  are  right.    I'm  certain.    Go  on." 

"If  one  of  those  ten  thousand  members  of  the 
Sokol  Society  had  thrown  back  his  brown  cloak 
and  shown  red  when  all  the  others  still  kept  them- 


COMPANIONSHIP  203 

selves  cloaked — if  he  was  a  normal  sensitive  man 
— he  might  have  felt  something  of  a  fool.  He 
might  have  felt  premature  and  presumptuous. 
Red  he  was  and  the  others  he  knew  were  red  also, 
but  why  show  it?  That  is  the  peculiar  distress  of 
people  like  ourselves,  who  have  some  sense  of 
history  and  some  sense  of  a  larger  life  within  us 
than  our  merely  personal  life.  We  don't  want 
to  go  on  with  the  old  story  merely.  We  want  to 
live  somehow  in  that  larger  life  and  to  live  for 
its  greater  ends  and  lose  something  unbearable 
of  ourselves,  and  in  wanting  to  do  that  we  are  only 
wanting  to  do  what  nearly  everybody  perhaps  is 
ripe  to  do  and  will  presently  want  to  do.  When 
the  New  Age  Martineau  talks  about  begins  to 
come  it  may  come  very  quickly — as  the  red  came 
at  Prague.  But  for  the  present  everyone  hesi- 
tates about  throwing  back  the  cloak." 

''Until  the  cloak  becomes  unbearable,"  she  said, 
repeating  his  word. 

"I  came  upon  this  holiday  in  Ihe  queerest 
state.  I  thoughl  I  was  ill.  I  thoughl  1  was  over- 
worked. Bui  the  real  I  rouble  was  a  loneliness  that 
robbed  me  of  all  driving  force.  Nobody  seemed 
thinking  and  feeling  wilh  me.  ...  I  have  never 
realized  until  now  whal  a  gregarious  beast  man 
is.  It  needed  only  a  day  or  so  with  Martineau, 
in  the  atmoi  phere  of  ideas  and  beliefs  like  my 
own,  to  begin  my  restoration.  Now  as  I  talk  to 
you That  is  why  I  have  clutched  at   your 


204        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

company.  Because  here  you  are,  coming  from 
thousands  of  miles  away,  and  you  talk  my  ideas, 
you  fall  into  my  ways  of  thought  as  though  we 
had  gone  to  the  same  school." 

"Perhaps  we  have  gone  to  the  same  school," 
she  said. 

"You  mean?" 

' '  Disappointment.  Disillusionment.  Having 
to  find  something  better  in  life  than  the  first  things 
it  promised  us." 

"But  you f    Disappointed?    I  thought  that 

in  America  people  might  be  educating  already  on 
different  lines " 

"Even  in  America,"  Miss  Grammont  said, 
"crops  only  grow  on  the  ploughed  land." 


§8 

Glastonbury  in  the  afternoon  was  wonderful; 
they  talked  of  Avalon  and  of  that  vanished  legend- 
ary world  of  King  Arthur  and  his  knights,  and 
in  the  early  evening  they  came  to  Wells  and  a 
pleasant  inn,  with  a  quaint  little  garden  before  its 
front  door  that  gave  directly  upon  the  cathe- 
dral. The  three  tourists  devoted  a  golden  half 
hour  before  dinner  to  the  sculptures  on  the  west- 
ern face.  The  great  screen  of  wrought  stone  rose 
up  warmly,  grey  and  clear  and  distinct  against  a 
clear  blue  sky  in  which  the  moon  hung,  round  and 


COMPANIONSHIP  205 

already  bright.  That  western  fagade  with  its  hun- 
dreds of  little  figures  tells  the  whole  story  of  God 
and  Man  from  Adam  to  the  Last  Judgment,  as  the 
mediaeval  mind  conceived  it.  It  is  an  even  fuller 
exposition  than  the  carved  Bible  history  that  goes 
round  the  chapter  house  at  Salisbury.  It  pre- 
sented the  universe,  said  Sir  Richmond,  as  a  com- 
plete crystal  globe.  It  explained  everything  in 
life  in  a  simple  and  natural  manner,  hope,  heaven, 
devil  and  despair.  Generations  had  lived  and 
died  mentally  within  that  crystal  globe,  convinced 
that  it  was  all  and  complete. 

"And  now,"  said  Miss  Grammont,  "we  are  in 
limitless  space  and  time.  The  crystal  globe  is 
broken." 

"And,"  said  Belinda  amazingly — for  she  had 
been  silent  for  some  time,  "the  goldfish  are  on  the 
floor,  V.V.  Free  to  flop  about.  Are  they  any 
happier?" 

It  was  one  of  those  sudden  rhetorical  triumphs 
that  are  best  left  alone.  "I  trow  not,"  said  Be- 
linda, giving  the  last  touch  to  it. 

After  dinner  Sir  Richmond  and  Miss  Grammont 
walked  round  the  cathedral  and  along  by  the  moai 
of  the  bishop's  palace,  and  Miss  Seyi'fert  slaved 
in  the  hotel  to  send  off  postcards  to  her  friend 
duty  she  had  neglected  for  some  days.  The  eve- 
ning was  warm  and  still  and  the  moon  was  ap- 
proaching its  full  and  very  bright.  Insensibly 
the  soft  afterglow  passed  into  moonlight. 


206    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

At  first  the  two  companions  talked  very  little. 
Sir  Richmond  was  well  content  with  this  tacit 
friendliness  and  Miss  Grammont  was  preoccupied 
because  she  was  very  strongly  moved  to  tell  him 
things  about  herself  that  hitherto  she  had  told  to 
no  one.  It  was  not  merely  that  she  wanted  to  tell 
him  these  things  but  also  that  for  reasons  she  did 
not  put  as  yet  very  clearly  to  herself  she  thought 
they  were  things  he  ought  to  know.  She  talked  of 
herself  at  first  in  general  terms.  "Life  comes  on 
anyone  with  a  rush,  childhood  seems  lasting  for 
ever  and  then  suddenly  one  tears  into  life,"  she 
said.  It  was  even  more  so  for  women  than  it  was 
for  men.  You  are  shown  life,  a  crowded  vast  spec- 
tacle full  of  what  seems  to  be  intensely  interesting 
activities  and  endless  delightful  and  frightful  and 
tragic  possibilities,  and  you  have  hardly  had  time 
to  look  at  it  before  you  are  called  upon  to  make 
decisions.  And  there  is  something  in  your  blood 
that  urges  you  to  decisive  acts.  Your  mind,  your 
reason  resists.  "Give  me  time,"  it  says.  "They 
clamour  at  you  with  treats,  crowds,  shows,  thea- 
tres, all  sorts  of  things ;  lovers  buzz  at  you,  each 
trying  to  fix  you  part  of  his  life  when  you  are  try- 
ing to  get  clear  to  live  a  little  of  your  own. ' '  Her 
father  had  had  one  merit  at  any  rate.  He  had 
been  jealous  of  her  lovers  and  very  ready  to 
interfere. 

"I  wanted  a  lover  to  love,"  she  said.  "Every 
girl  of  course  wants  that.     I  wanted  to  be  tre- 


COMPANIONSHIP  207 

mendously  excited.  .  .  .  And  at  the  same  time  I 
dreaded  the  enormous  interference.  .  .  . 

"I  wasn't  temperamentally  a  cold  girl.  Men 
interested  and  excited  me,  but  there  were  a  lot 
of  men  about  and  they  clashed  with  each  other. 
Perhaps  way  down  in  some  out  of  the  way  place 
I  should  have  fallen  in  love  quite  easily  with  the 
one  man  who  came  along.  But  no  man  fixed  his 
image.  After  a  year  or  so  I  think  I  began  to  lose 
the  power  which  is  natural  to  a  young  girl  of  fall- 
ing very  easily  into  love.  I  became  critical  of  the 
youths  and  men  who  were  attracted  to  me  and  I 
became  analytical  about  myself.  .  .  . 

"I  suppose  it  is  because  you  and  I  are  going  to 
part  so  soon  that  I  can  speak  so  freely  to  you. 
.  .  .  But  there  are  things  about  myself  that  I 
have  never  had  out  even  with  myself.  I  can  talk 
to  myself  in  you " 

She  paused  baffled.  "I  know  exactly,"  said 
Sir  Richmond. 

"In  my  composition  I  perceive  there  have  al- 
ways been  two  ruling  strains.  1  was  a  spoilt 
child  at  home,  a  rather  reserved  girl  at  school, 
keen  on  my  dignity.  I  liked  respect.  I  didn't 
give  myself  away.  I  suppose  one  would  call  that 
persona]  pride.  Anyhow  il  was  that  streak  made 
me  value  the  position  of  being  a  rich  married 
woman  in  Ww  York.  Thai  was  wliv  I  became  en- 
ed  i'»  Lake.    1  [e  seemed  to  be  i  >d  a  man 

as  there  was  about.     He  said  he  adored  me  and 


208        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

wanted  me  to  crown  his  life.  He  wasn't  ill-look- 
ing or  ill-mannered.  The  second  main  streak  in 
my  nature  wouldn't  however  fit  in  with  that." 

She  stopped  short. 

"The  second  streak,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Oh! Love  of  beauty,  love  of  romance.    I 

want  to  give  things  their  proper  names;  I  don't 
want  to  pretend  to  you.  ...  It  was  more  or  less 
than  that.  ...  It  was — imaginative  sensuous- 
ness.  Why  should  I  pretend  it  wasn't  in  me?  I 
believe  that  streak  is  in  all  women." 

"I  believe  so  too.    In  all  properly  constituted 


women. ' ' 


"I  tried  to  devote  that  streak  to  Lake,"  she 
said.  "I  did  my  best  for  him.  But  Lake  was 
much  too  much  of  a  gentleman  or  an  idealist.about 
women,  or  what  you  will,  to  know  his  business  as 
a  lover.  And  that  side  of  me  fell  in  love,  the 
rest  of  me  protesting,  with  a  man  named  Caston. 
It  was  a  notorious  affair.  Everybody  in  New 
York  couples  my  name  with  Caston.  Except  when 
my  father  is  about.  His  jealousy  has  blasted  an 
area  of  silence — in  that  matter — all  round  him. 
He  will  not  know  of  that  story.  And  they  dare 
not  tell  him.  I  should  pity  anyone  who  tried  to 
tell  it  him." 

"What  sort  of  man  was  this  Caston?" 
Miss  Grammont  seemed  to  consider.     She  did 
not  look  at  Sir  Richmond ;  she  kept  her  profile  to 
him. 


COMPANIONSHIP  209 

"He  was,"  she  said  deliberately,  "a  very  rot- 
ten sort  of  man." 

She  spoke  like  one  resolved  to  be  exact  and 
judicial.  "I  believe  I  always  knew  he  wasn't 
right.  But  he  was  very  handsome.  And  ten  years 
younger  than  Lake.  And  nobody  else  seemed  to 
be  all  right,  so  I  swallowed  that.  He  was  an  art- 
ist, a  painter.  Perhaps  you  know  his  work."  Sir 
Richmond  shook  his  head.  "He  could  make 
American  business  men  look  like  characters  out 
of  the  Three  Musketeers,  they  said,  and  he  was 
beginning  to  be  popular.  He  made  love  to  me. 
In  exactly  the  way  Lake  didn't.  If  I  shut  my  eyes 
to  one  or  two  things,  it  was  delightful.  I  liked  it. 
But  my  father  would  have  stood  a  painter  as  my 
husband  almost  as  cheerfully  as  he  would  a  man 
of  colour.    I  made  a  fool  of  myself,  as  people  say, 

about  Caston.     Well When  the  war  came, 

be  talked  in  a  way  that  irritated  me.  He  talked 
like  an  East  Side  Animiizio,  about  art  and  war. 
II  made  me  furious  to  know  it  was  all  talk  and 
that  he  didn't  mean  business.  ...  I  made  him 
go." 

She  paused  for  a  moment.     "He  hated  to  go. 

"Then  I  relented.  Or  I  missed  him  and  I 
wanted  to  be  made  love  to.  Or  I  really  wauled  to 
go  on  my  own  account.  I  forget.  I  forget  my 
motives  altogether  now.    Thai  early  war  time  was 

;i  queer  time  for  everyone.    A  kind  of  wildness 

got  into  the  blood.  ...     I  threw  over  Lake.    All 


210    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  time  things  had  been  going  on,  in  New  York- 
I  had  still  been  engaged  to  Lake.  I  went  to 
France.  I  did  good  work.  I  did  do  good  work. 
And  also  things  were  possible  that  would  have 
seemed  fantastic  in  America.  You  know  some- 
thing of  the  war-time  atmosphere.  There  was 
death  everywhere  and  people  snatched  at  gratifi- 
cations. Caston  made  ' To-morrow  we  die'  his  text. 
We  contrived  three  days  in  Paris  together — not 
very  cleverly.  All  sorts  of  people  know  about  it. 
.  .  .  We  went  very  far. ' ' 

She  stopped  short. 

'  'Well?"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

".He  did  die.  .  .  ." 

Another  long  pause.  "They  told  me  Caston 
had  been  killed.  But  someone  hinted — or  I 
guessed — that  there  was  more  in  it  than  an  or- 
dinary casualty. 

"Nobody,  I  think,  realizes  that  I  know.  This 
is  the  first  time  I  have  ever  confessed  that  I 
do  know.  He  was  shot.  He  was  shot  for 
cowardice. ' ' 

"That  might  happen  to  any  man,"  said  Sir 
Richmond  presently.  "No  man  is  a  hero  all 
round  the  twenty-four  hours.  Perhaps  he  was 
caught  by  circumstances,  unprepared.  He  may 
have  been  taken  by  surprise." 

"It  was  the  most  calculated,  cold-blooded  cow- 
ardice imaginable.  He  let  three  other  men  go  on 
5ind  get  killed.  .  .  . 


COMPANIONSHIP  211 

"No.  It  is  no  good  your  inventing  excuses  for 
a  man  you  know  nothing  about.  It  was  vile,  con- 
temptible cowardice — and  meanness.  It  fitted  in 
with  a  score  of  ugly  little  things  I  remembered. 
It  explained  them  all.  I  know  the  evidence  and 
the  judgment  against  him  were  strictly  just  and 
true,  because  they  were  exactly  in  character. 
.  .  .  And  that,  you  see,  was  my  man.  That  was 
the  lover  I  had  chosen.  That  was  the  man  to 
whom  I  had  given  myself  with  both  hands." 

Her  soft  unhurrying  voice  halted  for  a  time, 
and  then  resumed  in  the  same  even  tones  of  care- 
ful statement.  ' '  I  wasn 't  disgusted,  not  even  with 
myself.  About  him  I  was  chiefly  sorry,  intensely 
sorry,  because  I  had  made  him  come  out  of  a  life 
that  suited  and  protected  him,  to  the  war.  About 
myself,  I  was  stunned  and  perplexed.  I  had  the 
clearest  realization  that  what  you  and  I  have 
been  calling  the  bright  little  personal  life  had 
broken  off  short  and  was  spoilt  and  over  and 
done  with.  I  frit  as  though  it  was  my  body  they 
had  shot.  And  there  I  was,  with  fifty  years  of 
life  left  in  me  and  nothing  particular  to  do  with 
them." 

"That  was  just  the  prelude  to  life,"  said  Sir 
Richmond. 

"It  didn't  seem  so  al  the  time.    I  frit   I  liad  lo 

:   hold  ..!'  something  or  go  to  pieces.     I  COUldnM 

turn  to  religion.    I  had  no  religion.    And  Duly: 

What  is  Duly?    I  sH  myself  to  that.     I  had  a  kind 


212        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

of  revelation  one  night.  'Either  I  find  out  what 
all  this  world  is  about,'  I  said,  'or  I  perish.'  I 
have  lost  myself  and  I  must  forget  myself — by 
getting  hold  of  something  bigger  than  myself. 
And  becoming  that.  That 's  why  I  have  been  mak- 
ing a  sort  of  historical  pilgrimage.  .  .  .  That's 
my  story,  Sir  Richmond.  That's  my  education. 
.  .  .  Somehow  though  your  troubles  are  different, 
it  seems  to  me  that  my  little  muddle  makes  me  un- 
derstand how  it  is  with  you.  What  you've  got, 
this  idea  of  a  scientific  ordering  of  the  world,  is 
what  I,  in  my  3rounger,  less  experienced  way,  have 
been  feeling  my  way  towards.  I  want  to  join  on. 
I  want  to  get  hold  of  this  idea  of  a  great  fuel  con- 
trol in  the  world  and  of  a  still  greater  economic 
and  educational  control  of  which  it  is  a  part.  I 
want  to  make  that  idea  a  part  of  myself.  Rather  I 
want  to  make  myself  a  part  of  it.  When  you  talk 
of  it  I  believe  in  it  altogether." 

"And  I  believe  in  it,  when  I  talk  of  it  to  you." 

Sir  Richmond  was  stirred  very  deeply  by  Miss 
Grammont's  confidences.  His  dispute  with  Dr. 
Martineau  was  present  in  his  mind,  so  that  he 
did  not  want  to  make  love  to  her.  But  he  was  ex- 
tremely anxious  to  express  his  vivid  sense  of  the 
value  of  her  friendship.  And  while  he  hesitated 
over  this  difficult  and  unfamiliar  task  she  began 


COMPANIONSHIP  213 

to  talk  again  of  herself,  and  in  such  a  way  as  to 
give  a  new  turn  to  Sir  Richmond's  thoughts. 

" Perhaps  I  ought  to  tell  you  a  little  more  about 
myself,"  she  said;  "now  that  I  have  told  you  so 
much.  I  did  a  thing  that  still  puzzles  me.  I  was 
filled  with  a  sense  of  hopeless  disaster  in  France 
and  I  suppose  I  had  some  sort  of  desperate  idea 
of  saving  something  out  of  the  situation.  ...  I 
renewed  my  correspondence  with  Gunter  Lake. 
He  made  the  suggestion  I  knew  he  would  make, 
and  I  renewed  our  engagement." 

"To  go  back  to  wealth  and  dignity  in  New 
York?" 

"Yes." 

"But  you  don't  love  him?" 

"That's  always  been  plain  to  me.  But  what  I 
didn't  realize,  until  I  had  given  my  promise  over 
again,  was  that  I  dislike  him — acutely." 

"You  hadn't  realized  that  before?" 

"I  hadn't  thought  about  him  sufficiently.  But 
now  I  had  to  think  about  him  a  lot.  The  other 
affair  had  given  me  an  idea  perhaps  ol*  what  it 
means  to  be  married  to  a  man.  And  here  I  am 
drifting  hack  to  him.  The  horrible  thing  abont 
him  is  the  steady — enveloping  way  in  which  he 
has  always  come  at  me.  Without  fellowship. 
Without  any  community  of  ideas.  Ready  to  make 
the  mo  traordinary  bargains.  So  long  as  he 
can  in  any  way  fix  me  and  gel  me.  Whal  does  if 
meant     What    is   there   behind   those   watching, 


214        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

soliciting  eyes  of  his?  I  don't  in  the  least  love 
him,  and  this  desire  and  service  and  all  the  rest 
of  it  he  offers  me — it's  not  love.  It's  not  even 
such  love  as  Caston  gave  me.  It's  a  game  he  plays 
with  his  imagination." 

She  had  released  a  flood  of  new  ideas  in  Sir 
Eichmond's  mind.  "This  is — illuminating,"  he 
said.  "You  dislike  Lake  acutely.  You  always 
have  disliked  him. ' ' 

"I  suppose  I  have.  But  it's  only  now  I  admit 
it  to  myself." 

"Yes.    And You  might,  for  example,  have 

married  him  in  New  York  before  the  war. ' ' 

"It  came  very  near  to  that." 

"And  then  probably  you  wouldn't  have  dis- 
covered you  disliked  him.  You  wouldn't  have 
admitted  it  to  yourself." 

"I  suppose  I  shouldn't.  I  suppose  I  should 
have  tried  to  believe  I  loved  him." 

"Women  do  this  sort  of  thing.  Odd!  I  never 
realized  it  before.  And  there  are  endless  wives 
suppressing  an  acute  dislike.  My  wife  does.  I 
see  now  quite  clearly  that  she  detests  me.  Rea- 
sonably enough.  From  her  angle  I'm  entirely 
detestable.  But  she  won't  admit  it,  won't  know 
of  it.  She  never  will.  To  the  end  of  my  life,  al- 
ways, she  will  keep  that  detestation  unconfessed. 
She  puts  a  face  on  the  matter.  "We  both  do.  .And 
this  affair  of  yours.  .  .  .  Have  you  thought  how 
unjust  it  is  to  Lake?" 


COMPANIONSHIP  215 


a 
if 


Not  nearly  so  much  as  I  might  have  done." 
: It  is  unfair  to  him.  Atrociously  unfair.  He's 
not  my  sort  of  man,  perhaps,  but  it  will  hurt  him 
cruelly  according  to  the  peculiar  laws  of  his  be- 
ing. He  seems  to  me  a  crawling  sort  of  lover — 
with  an  immense  self-conceit  at  the  back  of  his 
crawlingness." 

"He  has,"  she  endorsed. 

"He  backs  himself  to  crawl — until  he  crawls  tri- 
umphantly right  over  you.  ...  I  don't  like  to 
think  of  the  dream  he  has.  ...  I  take  it  he  will 
lose.    Is  it  fair  to  go  into  this  game  with  him?" 

"In  the  interests  of  Lake,"  she  said,  smiling 
softly  at  Sir  Richmond  in  the  moonlight.  "But 
you  are  perfectly  right." 

"And  suppose  he  doesn't  lose!" 

Sir  Richmond  found  himself  uttering  senti- 
menls. 

"Thorn  is  only  one  decent  way  in  which  a  civi- 
lized mail  and  a  civilized  woman  may  approach 
one  another.  Passionate  desire  is  not  enough. 
What  is  called  love  is  nol  enough.  Pledges,  ra- 
tional considerations,  all  these  things  arc  worth- 
i.  All  these  limits  arc  compatible  with  hale 
Tin-  primary  essential  is  friendship,  clear  under- 
standing, absolute  confidence.  Then  within  that 
condition,  in  that  eleci  relationship,  l«>vc  is  per- 
ble,  mating,  marriage  or  no  marriage,  as  you 
will-  nil  things  are  permissible.  .  . 

I     Hue   ;i    long   \r.\\l    >•    1m  ■iwei-ll    Hm'III. 


J 1 


216        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

1 'Dear  old  cathedral,"  said  Miss  Grammont, 
a  little  irrelevantly.  She  had  an  air  of  having 
concluded  something  that  to  Sir  Richmond  seemed 
scarcely  to  have  begun.  She  stood  looking  at  the 
great  dark  facade  edged  with  moonlight  for  some 
moments,  and  then  turned  towards  the  hotel, 
which  showed  a  pink-lit  window. 

"I  wonder,"  she  said,  ''if  Belinda  is  still  up. 
And  what  she  will  think  when  I  tell  her  of  the 
final  extinction  of  Mr.  Lake.  I  think  she  rather 
looked  forward  to  being  the  intimate  friend, 
secrets  and  everything,  of  Mrs.  Gunter  Lake." 

$  10 

Sir  Richmond  woke  up  at  dawn  and  he  woke  out 
of  an  extraordinary  dream.  He  was  saying  to 
Miss  Grammont:  "There  is  no  other  marriage 
than  the  marriage  of  true  minds.  There  is  no 
other  marriage  than  the  marriage  of  true  minds." 
He  saw  her  as  he  had  seen  her  the  evening  before, 
light  and  cool,  coming  towards  him  in  the  moon- 
light from  the  hotel.  But  also  in  the  inconsistent 
way  of  dreams  he  was  very  close  to  her  kind, 
faintly  smiling  face,  and  his  eyes  were  wet  with 
tears  and  he  was  kissing  her  hand.  "My  dear 
wife  and  mate,"  he  was  saying,  and  suddenly  he 
was  kissing  her  cool  lips. 

He  woke  up  and  stared  at  his  dream,  which 
faded  out  only  very  slowly  before  the  fresh  sun- 


COMPANIONSHIP  217 

rise  upon  the  red  tiles  and  tree  boughs  outside  the 
open  window,  and  before  the  first  stir  and  clamour 
of  the  birds. 

He  felt  like  a  court  in  which  some  overwhelm- 
ingly revolutionary  piece  of  evidence  had  been 
tendered.  All  the  elaborate  defence  had  broken 
down  at  one  blow.  He  sat  up  on  the  edge  of  his 
bed,  facing  the  new  fact. 

"This  is  monstrous  and  ridiculous,"  he  said, 
"and  Martineau  judged  me  exactly.  I  am  in  love 
with  her.  ...  I  am  head  over  heels  in  love  with 
her.  I  have  never  been  so  much  in  love  or  so 
truly  in  love  with  anyone  before." 


§  11 

That  was  the  dawn  of  a  long  day  of  tension  for 
Sir  Richmond  and  Miss  G-rammont.  Because  each 
was  now  vividly  aware  of  being  in  love  with  the 
other  and  so  neither  was  able  to  sec  how  lliings 
were  with  the  oilier.  They  were  afraid  of  each 
other.  A  r<  straint  had  come  upon  them  both,  a 
traint  thai  was  greatly  enhanced  by  their  sense 
of  Belinda,  acutely  observant,  ostentatiously  tad 
I'u)  ;i!id  self -effacing,  and  prepared  a1  the  slightest 
encouragement  to  1»'  overwhelmingly  romantic 
and  sympathetic.  Their  tali  waned,  and  was  re 
vived  <<»  an  artificial  activity  and  waned  again. 
The  historical  interest  had  evaporated  from  the 


218    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

west  of  England  and  left  only  an  urgent  and  em- 
barrassing present. 

But  the  loveliness  of  the  weather  did  not  fail, 
and  the  whole  day  was  set  in  Severn  landscapes. 
They  first  saw  the  great  river  like  a  sea  with  the 
Welsh  mountains  hanging  in  the  sky  behind  as 
they  came  over  the  Mendip  crest  above  Shipham. 
They  saw  it  again  as  they  crossed  the  hill  before 
Clifton  Bridge,  and  so  they  continued,  climbing  to 
hill  crests  for  views  at  Alveston  and  near  Dursley, 
and  so  to  Gloucester  and  the  lowest  bridge  and 
thence  back  down  stream  again  through  fat 
meadow  lands  at  first  and  much  apple-blossom  and 
then  over  gentle  hills  through  wide,  pale  Newn- 
ham  and  Lidney  and  Alvington  and  Woolaston  to 
old  Chepstow  and  its  brown  castle,  always  with 
the  widening  estuary  to  the  left  of  them  and  its 
foaming  shoals  and  shining  sand  banks.  From 
Chepstow  they  turned  back  north  along  the  steep 
Wye  gorge  to  Tintern,  and  there  at  the  snug  little 
Beaufort  Arms  with  its  prim  lawn  and  flower  gar- 
den they  ended  the  day's  journey. 

Tintern  Abbey  they  thought  a  poor  graceless 
mass  of  ruin  down  beside  the  river,  and  it  was 
fenced  about  jealously  and  locked  up  from  their 
invasion.  After  dinner  Sir  Richmond  and  Miss 
Grammont  went  for  a  walk  in  the  mingled  twilight 
and  moonlight  up  the  hill  towarfts  Chepstow.  Both 
of  them  were  absurdly  and  nervously  pressing  to 
Belinda  to  come  with  them,  but  she  was  far  too 


COMPANIONSHIP  219 

wise  to  take  this  sudden  desire  for  her  company 
seriously.  Her  dinner  shoes,  she  said,  were  too 
thin.  Perhaps  she  would  change  and  come  out  a 
little  later.  "Yes,  come  later,"  said  Miss  Gram- 
mont  and  led  the  way  to  the  door. 

They  passed  through  the  garden.  "I  think  we 
go  up  the  hill  I ' '  said  Sir  Richmond. 

''Yes,"  she  agreed,  "up  the  hill." 

Followed  a  silence. 

Sir  Richmond  made  an  effort,  but  after  some 
artificial  and  discoimected  talk  about  Tintern 
Abbey,  concerning  which  she  had  no  history  ready, 
and  then,  still  lamer,  about  whether  Monmouth- 
shire is  in  England  or  Wales,  silence  fell  again. 
The  silence  lengthened,  assumed  a  significance,  a 
dignity  that  no  common  words  might  break. 

Then  Sir  Richmond  spoke.    "I  love  you,"  he 
aid,  "with  all  my  heart." 

Her  soft  voire  came  back  after  a  stillness.  "I 
love  you,"  she  said,  "with  all  myself." 

"  I  had  long  ceased  to  hope,"  said  Sir  Richmond, 
"thai  I  should  ever  find  a  friend  ...  a  lover 
.  .  .  perfect  companionship.  .  .  ." 

They    went    on    walking    side    by    side,    without 

touching  each  other  or  turning  to  each  other. 

"All  the  things  I  wanted  to  think  I  believe 
have  come  alive  in  me,"  she  said.  .  .  . 

"Cool  and  sweet,"  said  Sir  Richmond.     "Such 

bappinee    a    I  could  no1  have  imagined." 
Tin-  light  of  a  silent  bicycle  appeared  above 


220         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

them  up  the  hill  and  swept  down  upon  them,  lit 
their  two  still  faces  brightly  and  passed. 

"My  dear,"  she  whispered  in  the  darkness  be- 
tween the  high  hedges. 

They  stopped  short  and  stood  quite  still,  trem- 
bling. He  saw  her  face,  dim  and  tender,  looking 
up  to  his. 

Then  he  took  her  in  his  arms  and  kissed  her 
lips  as  he  had  desired  in  his  dream.  .  .  . 

When  they  returned  to  the  inn  Belinda  Seyffert 
offered  flat  explanations  of  why  she  had  not  fol- 
lowed them,  and  enlarged  upon  the  moonlight  ef- 
fect of  the  Abbey  ruins  from  the  inn  lawn.  But 
the  scared  congratulations  in  her  eyes  betrayed 
her  recognition  that  momentous  things  had  hap- 
pened between  the  two. 


CHAPTER  THE  EIGHTH 

Full  Moon 

§  1 

Sm  Richmond  had  talked  in  the  moonlight  and 
shadows  of  having  found  such  happiness  as  he 
could  not  have  imagined.  But  when  he  awoke  in 
the  night  that  happiness  had  evaporated.  He 
awoke  suddenly  out  of  this  love  dream  that  had 
lasted  now  for  nearly  four  days  and  he  awoke  in 
a  mood  of  astonishment  and  dismay. 

He  had  thought  that  when  he  parted  from  Dr. 
Martineau  he  had  parted  also  from  that  process 
of  self-exploration  that  they  had  started  together, 
but  now  he  awakened  to  find  it  established  and  in 
full  activity  in  his  mind.  Something  or  someone, 
a  sort  of  etherealized  Martinean-Hardy,  an  ab- 
stracted intellectual  conscience,  was  demanding 
what  he  though!  he  was  doing  with  Miss  Gram 
mont  and  whither  he  thought  he  was  taking  her, 
how  he  proposed  to  reconcile  the  close  relationship 
with  her  thai  he  was  now  embarked  upon  with, 
in  the  firsl  place,  his  work  upon  and  engagements 
with  the  Fuel  Commission,  and,  in  the  second 
place,   Martin  Leeds.     Curiously    enough   Lady 

221 


222        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Hardy  didn't  come  into  the  case  at  all.  He  had 
done  his  utmost  to  keep  Martin  Leeds  out  of  his 
head  throughout  the  development  of  this  affair. 
Now  in  an  unruly  and  determined  way  that  was 
extremely  characteristic  of  her  she  seemed  reso- 
lute to  break  in. 

She  appeared  as  an  advocate,  without  affection 
for  her  client  but  without  any  hostility,  of  the 
claims  of  Miss  Grammont  to  be  let  alone.  The 
elaborate  pretence  that  Sir  Richmond  had  main- 
tained to  himself  that  he  had  not  made  love  to  Miss 
Grammont,  that  their  mutual  attraction  had  been 
irresistible  and  had  achieved  its  end  in  spite  of 
their  resolute  and  complete  detachment,  collapsed 
and  vanished  from  his  mind.  He  admitted  to  him- 
self that  driven  by  a  kind  of  instinctive  necessity 
he  had  led  their  conversation  step  by  step  to  a 
realization  and  declaration  of  love,  and  that  it  did 
not  exonerate  him  in  the  least  that  Miss  Grammont 
had  been  quite  ready  and  willing  to  help  him  and 
meet  him  half  way.  She  wanted  love  as  a  woman 
does,  more  than  a  man  does,  and  he  had  steadily 
presented  himself  as  a  man  free  to  love,  able  to 
love  and  loving. 

"She  wanted  a  man  to  love,  she  wanted  per- 
fected fellowship,  and  you  have  made  her  that 
tremendous  promise.  That  was  implicit  in  your 
embrace.    And  how  can  you  keep  that  promise  1 ' ' 

It  was  as  if  Martin  spoke ;  it  was  her  voice ;  it 
was  the  very  quality  of  her  thought. 


FULL  MOON  228 

"You  belong  to  this  work  of  yours,  which  must 
needs  be  interrupted  or  abandoned  if  you  take 
her.  "Whatever  is  not  mortgaged  to  your  work  is 
mortgaged  to  me.  For  the  strange  thing  in  all 
this  is  that  you  and  I  love  one  another — and  have 
no  power  to  do  otherwise.    In  spite  of  all  this. 

"You  have  nothing  to  give  her  but  stolen 
goods,"  said  the  shadow  of  Martin.  "You  have 
nothing  to  give  anyone  personally  any  more.  .  .  . 

"Think  of  the  love  that  she  desires  and  think 
of  this  love  that  you  can  give.  .   .   . 

"Is  there  any  new  thing  in  you  that  you  can 
give  her  that  you  haven't  given  me?  You  and  I 
know  each  other  very  well ;  perhaps  I  know  you  too 
well.  Haven't  you  loved  me  as  much  as  you  can 
love  anyone  I  Think  oi'  all  that  there  has  been  be- 
tween us  that  you  are  ready  now,  eager  now  to 
set  aside  and  forget  as  though  it  had  never  been. 
For  four  days  you  have  kept  me  out  of  your  mind 
in  order  to  worship  her.  Yet  you  have  known  I 
then  —  for  all  you  would  not  know.  No  one 
e  will  ever  be  so  intimate  with  you  as  I  am. 
We  ha\  e  quarrelled  together,  wept  together,  jested 
happily  and  jested  bitterly.  You  have  spared  me 
at  all.  Pitiless  and  cruel  you  have  been  to  me. 
Von  have  reckoned  ap  all  my  faults  against  me 

though  they  wen    gins.     YOD   have  treated  me  at 

times  onlovingly—  never  was  Lover  treated  so  un- 
loving] on  h:  imetimes  treated  me.  And 
yet  1  have  your  love — as  no  other  woman  can  e 


224   SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

have  it.  Even  now  when  you  are  wildly  in  love 
with  this  girl's  freshness  and  boldness  and  clever- 
ness I  come  into  your  mind  by  right  and  necessity. 

1 '  She  is  different, ' '  argued  Sir  Richmond. 

"But  you  are  the  same,"  said  the  shadow  of 
Martin  with  Martin's  unsparing  return.  "Your 
love  has  never  been  a  steadfast  thing.  It  comes 
and  goes — like  the  wind.  You  are  an  extrava- 
gantly imperfect  lover.  But  I  have  learnt  to  ac- 
cept you,  as  people  accept  the  English  weather. 
.  .  .  Never  in  all  your  life  have  you  loved,  wholly, 
fully,  steadfastly — as  people  deserve  to  be  loved ; 
not  your  mother  nor  your  father,  not  your  wife 
nor  your  children,  nor  me,  nor  our  child,  nor  any 
living  thing.  Pleasant  to  all  of  us  at  times — at 
times  bitterly  disappointing.  You  do  not  even 
love  this  work  of  yours  steadfastly,  this  work  to 
which  you  sacrifice  us  all  in  turn.  You  do  not 
love  enough.  That  is  why  you  have  these  moods 
and  changes,  that  is  why  you  have  these  lassitudes. 
So  it  is  you  are  made.  .  .  . 

"And  that  is  why  you  must  not  take  this  brave 
young  life,  so  much  simpler  and  braver  than  your 
own,  and  exalt  it — as  you  can  do — and  then  fail 
it,  as  you  will  do.  ..." 

Sir  Richmond's  mind  and  body  lay  very  still  for 
a  time. 

"Should  I  fail  her?  .  .  ." 

For  a  time  Martin  Leeds  passed  from  the  fore- 
ground of  his  mind. 


FULL  MOON  225 

He  was  astonished  to  think  how  planless,  in- 
stinctive and  unforeseeing  his  treatment  of  Miss 
Grammont  had  been.  It  had  been  just  a  blind 
drive  to  get  hold  of  her  and  possess  her.  .  .  . 

Suddenly  his  passion  for  her  became  active  in 
its  defence  again. 

"But  is  there  such  a  thing  as  a  perfect  love? 
Is  yours  a  perfect  love,  my  dear  Martin,  with  its 
insatiable  jealousy,  its  ruthless  criticism?  Has 
the  world  ever  seen  a  perfect  lover  yet?  Isn't  it 
our  imperfection  that  brings  us  together  in  a 
common  need?  Is  Miss  Grammont,  after  all, 
likely  to  get  a  more  perfect  love  in  all  her  life  than 
this  poor  love  of  mine?  And  isn't  it  good  for  her 
that  she  should  love?" 

"Perfect  love  cherishes.  Perfect  love  fore- 
goes." 

Sir  Richmond  found  his  mind  wandering  far 
away  from  the  immediate  question.  "Perfect 
love,"  the  phrase  was  his  point  of  departure.  Was 
it  true  that  he  could  not  love  passionately  and 
completely?  Was  that  fundamentally  what  was 
tlM  matter  with  him.'  Was  that  perhaps  what  was 
the  matter  with  the  whole  world  of  mankind?  It 
had  not  yet  come  to  that  power  of  loving  which 
makes  action  full  and  simple  and  direct  and  un- 
hesitating.    Man  u)inii  his  planet   has  not  grown 

up  to  Love,  is  still  an  eager,  egotistical  and  fluc- 
tuating adolescent,  lie  lacks  the  courage  to  love 
and   the  wisdom  to   love.     Love   is  here.     But  it 


226        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

comes  and  goes,  it  is  mixed  with  greeds  and  jeal- 
ousies and  cowardice  and  cowardly  reservations. 
One  hears  it  only  in  snatches  and  single  notes. 
It  is  like  something  tuning  up  before  the  music 
begins.  .  .  .  The  metaphor  altogether  ran  away 
with  Sir  Eichmond's  half  dreaming  mind.  Some 
day  perhaps  all  life  would  go  to  music. 

Love  was  music  and  power.  If  he  had  loved 
enough  he  need  never  have  drifted  away  from  his 
wife.  Love  would  have  created  love,  would  have 
tolerated  and  taught  and  inspired.  Where  there 
is  perfect  love  there  is  neither  greed  nor  impa- 
tience. He  would  have  done  his  work  calmly.  He 
would  have  won  his  way  with  his  Committee 
instead  of  fighting  and  quarrelling  with  it 
perpetually.  .   .   . 

1 '  Flimsy  creatures, ' '  he  whispered.  * '  Uncertain 
health.  Uncertain  strength.  A  will  that  comes 
and  goes.  Moods  of  baseness.  Moods  of  utter 
beastliness.  .  .  .  Love  like  April  sunshine. 
April?  .  .  ." 

He  dozed  and  dreamt  for  a  time  of  spring  pass- 
ing into  a  high  summer  sunshine,  into  a  continuing 
music,  of  love.  He  thought  of  a  world  like  some 
great  playhouse  in  which  players  and  orchestra 
and  audience  all  co-operate  in  a  noble  production 
without  dissent  or  conflict.  He  thought  he  was 
the  savage  of  thirty  thousand  years  ago  dreaming 
of  the  great  world  that  is  still  perhaps  thirty 
thousand  years  ahead.    His  effort  to  see  more  of 


FULL  MOON  227 

that  coming  world  than  indistinct  and  cloudy 
pinnacles  and  to  hear  more  than  a  vague  music, 
dissolved  his  dream  and  left  him  awake  again  and 
wrestling  with  the  problem  of  Miss  Grammont. 

*  2 

The  shadow  of  Martin  stood  over  him,  inexor- 
able. He  had  to  release  Miss  Grammont  from  the 
adventure  into  which  he  had  drawn  her.  This  de- 
cision stood  out  stern  and  inevitable  in  his  mind 
with  no  conceivable  alternative. 

As  he  looked  at  the  task  before  him  he  began 
to  realize  its  difficulty.  He  was  profoundly  in 
love  with  her,  he  was  still  only  learning  how 
deeply,  and  she  was  not  going  to  play  a  merely 
passive  part  in  this  affair.  She  was  perhaps  as 
deeply  in  love  with  him.  .  .  . 

He  could  not  bring  himself  to  the  idea  of  con- 
fessions and  disavowals.  He  could  not  bear  to 
think  of  her  disillusionment.  He  felt  that  he  owed 
it  to  her  not  to  disillusion  her,  to  spoil  things  for 
her  in  that  fashion.  "To  turn  into  something 
mean  and  ngly  after  she  1ms  believed  in  me.  .  .  . 
It  would  be  like  playing  a  practical  joke  upon  her. 
Tt  would  be  like  taking  her  into  my  arms  and  sud- 
denly making  a  grimace  at  her.  .  .  .  Tt  would  scar 
her  with  a  Becond  humiliation.  .  .  ." 

Should  he  take  her  on  to  Bath  or  Exeter  to-mor- 
row and  contrive  by  some  sudden  arrival  of  tele- 


228         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

grams  that  he  had  to  go  from  her  suddenly?  But 
a  mere  sudden  parting  would  not  end  things  be- 
tween them  now  unless  he  went  off  abruptly  with- 
out explanations  or  any  arrangements  for  further 
communications.  At  the  outset  of  this  escapade 
there  had  been  a  tacit  but  evident  assumption  that 
it  was  to  end  when  she  joined  her  father  at  Fal- 
mouth. It  was  with  an  effect  of  discovery  that  Sir 
Richmond  realized  that  now  it  could  not  end  in 
that  fashion,  that  with  the  whisper  of  love  and 
the  touching  of  lips,  something  had  been  started 
that  would  go  on,  that  would  develop.  To  break 
off  now  and  go  away  without  a  word  would  leave  a 
raw  and  torn  end,  would  leave  her  perplexed  and 
perhaps  even  more  humiliated  with  an  aching  mys- 
tery to  distress  her.  "Why  did  he  go?  Was  it 
something  I  said? — something  he  found  out  or 
imagined  ? ' ' 

Parting  had  disappeared  as  a  possible  solution 
of  this  problem.  She  and  he  had  got  into  each 
other's  lives  to  stay:  the  real  problem  was  the 
terms  upon  which  they  were  to  stay  in  each  other's 
lives.  Close  association  had  brought  them  to  the 
point  of  being,  in  the  completest  sense,  lovers; 
that  could  not  be;  and  the  real  problem  was  the 
transmutation  of  their  relationship  to  some  form 
compatible  with  his  honour  and  her  happiness.  A 
word,  an  idea,  from  some  recent  reading  floated 
into  Sir  Richmond's  head.  "Sublimate,"  he 
whispered.     "We  have  to  sublimate  this  affair. 


FULL  MOON  229 

We  have  to  put  this  relationship  upon  a  Higher 
Plane." 

His  mind  stopped  short  at  that. 

Presently  his  voice  sounded  out  of  the  depths  of 
his  heart.  "God!  How  I  loathe  the  Higher 
Plane!  .  .  . 

"God  has  put  me  into  this  Higher  Plane  busi- 
ness like  some  poor  little  kid  who  has  to  wear 
irons  on  its  legs. 

"I  want  her.  ...  Do  you  hear,  Martin?  I 
want  her." 

As  if  by  a  lightning  flash  he  saw  his  car  with 
himself  and  Miss  Grammont — Miss  Seyffert  had 
probably  fallen  out — traversing  Europe  and  Asia 
in  headlong  flight.  To  a  sunlit  beach  in  the  South 
Seas.  .  .  . 

His  thoughts  presently  resumed  as  though  these 
unmannerly  and  fantastic  interruptions  had  not 
occurred. 

"We  have  to  carry  the  whole  affair  on  to  a 
Higher  Plane — and  keep  it  there.  We  two  love 
one  another — that  has  to  be  admitted  now.  (I 
ought  never  to  have  touched  her.  I  ought  never 
to  have  thought  of  touching  her.)  But  we  two 
are  too  high,  our  aims  and  work  and  obligations 
are  too  high  for  any  ordinary  love  making.  That 
sort  of  tiling  would  embarrass  us,  would  spoil 
everything. 

"Spoil  everything,"  he  repeated,  rather  like  a 
small  boy  who  learns  an  unpalatable  lesson. 


230        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

For  a  time  Sir  Richmond,  exhausted  by  moral 
effort,  lay  staring  at  the  darkness. 

' 'It  has  to  be  done.  I  believe  I  can  carry  her 
through  with  it  if  I  can  carry  myself.  She's  a 
finer  thing  than  I  am.  .  .  .  On  the  whole  I  am  glad 
it's  only  one  more  day.  Belinda  will  be  about.  .  .  . 
Afterwards  we  can  write  to  each  other.  .  .  .  If  we 
can  get  over  the  next  day  it  will  be  all  right.  Then 
we  can  write  about  fuel  and  politics — and  there 
won't  be  her  voice  and  her  presence.  We  shall 
really  sublimate.  .  .  .  First  class  idea, — subli- 
mate !  .  .  .  And  I  will  go  back  to  dear  old  Martin 
who's  all  alone  there  and  miserable;  I'll  be  kind 
to  her  and  play  my  part  and  tell  her  her  Carbuncle 
scar  rather  becomes  her.  .  .  .  And  in  a  little  while 
I  shall  be  altogether  in  love  with  her  again.  .  .   . 

" Queer  what  a  brute  I've  always  been  to 
Martin." 

"Queer  that  Martin  can  come  in  a  dream  to 
me  and  take  the  upper  hand  with  me.  .   .  . 

"Queer  that  now — I  love  Martin." 

He  thought  still  more  profoundly.  "By  the 
time  the  Committee  meets  again  I  shall  have  been 
tremendously  refreshed. ' ' 

He  repeated : — "Put  things  on  the  Higher  Plane 
and  keep  them  there.  Then  go  back  to  Martin. 
And  so  to  the  work.    That's  it.  .   .   ." 

Nothing  so  pacifies  the  mind  as  a  clear-cut  pur- 
pose. Sir  Richmond  fell  asleep  during  the  fourth 
recapitulation  of  this  programme. 


FULL  MOON  231 


§3 


When  Miss  Grammont  appeared  at  breakfast 
Sir  Richmond  saw  at  once  that  she  too  had  had  a 
restless  night.  When  she  came  into  the  little  long 
breakfast  room  of  the  inn  with  its  brown  screens 
and  its  neat  white  tables  it  seemed  to  him  that  the 
Miss  Grammont  of  his  nocturnal  speculations,  the 
beautiful  young  lady  who  had  to  be  protected  and 
managed  and  loved  unselfishly,  vanished  like  some 
exorcised  intruder.  Instead  was  this  real  dear 
young  woman,  who  had  been  completely  forgotten 
during  the  reign  of  her  simulacrum  and  who 
now  returned  completely  remembered,  familiar, 
friendly,  intimate.  She  touched  his  hand  for  a 
moment,  she  met  his  eyes  with  the  shadow  of  a 
smile  in  her  own. 

" Oranges!"  said  Belinda  from  the  table  by  the 
window.    "Beautiful  oranges." 

She  had  been  preparing  them,  poor  Trans- 
atlantic exile,  after  the  fashion  in  which  grape 
fruits  are  prepared  npon  liners  and  in  the  civi- 
lized world  of  the  west.  "lie's  getting  us  tea 
spoons,"  said  Belinda,  as  they  sal  down. 

"This  is  realler  England  than  ever,"  she  said. 
"I've  been  up  an  hour.  I  found  a  little  path 
down  to  the  river  bank.  If  'a  the  greenest  morning 
world  and  full  of  wild  flowers.    Look  af  these." 


232    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

''That's  lady's  smock,"  said  Sir  Richmond. 
"It's  not  really  a  flower;  it's  a  quotation  from 
Shakespear." 

"And  there  are  cowslips!" 

"Cuckoo  buds  of  yellow  hue.  Do  paint  the 
meadows  with  delight.  All  the  English  flowers 
come  out  of  Shakespear.  I  don't  know  what  we 
did  before  his  time." 

The  waiter  arrived  with  the  tea  spoons  for  the 
oranges. 

Belinda,  having  distributed  these,  resumed  her 
discourse  of  enthusiasm  for  England.  She  asked 
a  score  of  questions  about  Gloucester  and  Chep- 
stow, the  Severn  and  the  Romans  and  the  Welsh, 
and  did  not  wait  for  the  answers.  She  did  not 
want  answers;  she  talked  to  keep  things  going. 
Her  talk  masked  a  certain  constraint  that  came 
upon  her  companions  after  the  first  morning's 
greetings  were  over. 

Sir  Richmond  as  he  had  planned  upstairs  pro- 
duced two  Michelin  maps.  "To-day,"  he  said, 
"we  will  run  back  to  Bath — from  which  it  will  be 
easy  for  you  to  train  to  Falmouth.  We  will  go 
by  Monmouth  and  then  turn  back  through  the 
Forest  of  Dean,  where  you  will  get  glimpses  of 
primitive  coai  mines  still  worked  by  two  men  and 
a  boy  with  a  windlass  and  a  pail.  Perhaps  we  will 
go  through  Cirencester.  I  don't  know.  Perhaps 
it  is  better  to  go  straight  to  Bath.  In  the  very 
heart  of  Bath  you  will  find  yourselves  in  just  the 


FULL  MOON  233 

same  world  you  visited  at  Pompeii.  Bath  is 
Pompeii  overlaid  by  Jane  Austen's  England." 

He  paused  for  a  moment.  "We  can  wire  to 
your  agents  from  here  before  we  start  and  we  can 
pick  up  their  reply  at  Gloucester  or  Nailsworth 
or  even  Bath  itself.  So  that  if  your  father  is 
nearer  than  we  suppose But  I  think  to-mor- 
row afternoon  will  be  soon  enough  for  Falmouth, 
anyhow." 

He  stopped  interrogatively. 

Miss  Grammont's  face  was  white.  "That  will 
do  very  well,"  she  said. 


They  started,  but  presently  they  came  to  high 
banks  that  showed  such  masses  of  bluebells, 
ragged  Robin,  great  stitchwort  and  the  like  that 
Belinda  was  not  to  be  restrained.  She  clamoured 
to  stop  the  car  and  go  up  the  bank  and  pick  her 
hands  full,  and  so  they  drew  up  by  the  roadside 
and  Sir  Kiehmond  and  Miss  Grammont  sat  down 
near  the  car  while  Belinda  carried  her  enthusiastic 
onslaught  on  the  flowers  up  the  steep  bank  and 
presently  out  of  earshot. 

The  two  lovers  said  unheeded  things  about  the 
flowers  to  each  other  and  then  fell  silent.  Then 
Miss  Grammont  turned  her  head  and  seemed  de- 
liberately to  measure  her  companion's  distance 
Evidently  she  judged  her  out  of  earshot. 


234        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"Well,"  said  Miss  Grammont  in  her  soft  even 
voice.    "We  love  one  another.    Is  that  so  still?" 

"I  could  not  love  you  more." 

"It  wasn't  a  dream ?" 

"No." 

1 '  And  to-morrow  we  part  ? ' ' 

He  looked  her  in  the  eyes.  "I  have  been  think- 
ing of  that  all  night,"  he  said  at  last. 

"I  too." 

"And  you  think ?" 

' '  That  we  must  part.  Just  as  we  arranged  it — 
when  was  it?  Three  days  or  three  ages  ago? 
There  is  nothing  else  in  the  world  to  do  except  for 
us  to  go  our  ways.  ...  I  love  you.    That  means 

for  a  woman It  means  that  I  want  to  be  with 

you.  But  that  is  impossible.  .  .  .  Don't  doubt 
whether  I  love  you  because  I  say — impos- 
sible. ..." 

Sir  Richmond,  faced  with  his  own  nocturnal  de- 
cision, was  now  moved  to  oppose  it  flatly.  "Noth- 
ing that  one  can  do  is  impossible." 

She  glanced  again  at  Belinda  and  bent  down  to- 
wards him.  "Suppose,"  she  said,  "you  got  back 
into  that  car  with  me ;  suppose  that  instead  of  go- 
ing on  as  we  have  planned,  you  took  me — away. 
How  much  of  us  would  go?" 

' '  You  would  go, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond,  ' '  and  my 
heart." 

"And  this  work  of  yours?  And  your  honour? 
For  the  honour  of  a  man  in  this  New  Age  of 


FULL  MOON  235 

yours  will  be  first  of  all  in  the  work  he  does  for  the 
world.  And  you  will  leave  your  work — to  be  just 
a  lover.  And  the  work  that  I  might  do — because 
of  my  father's  wealth;  all  that  would  vanish  too. 
We  should  leave  all  of  that,  all  of  our  usefulness, 
all  that  much  of  ourselves.  But  what  has  made 
me  love  you?  Just  your  breadth  of  vision,  just 
the  sense  that  you  mattered.  What  has  made  you 
love  me !  Just  that  I  have  understood  the  dream 
of  your  work.  All  that  we  should  have  to  leave 
behind.  We  should  specialize,  in  our  own  scandal. 
We  should  run  away  just  for  one  thing.  To  think, 
by  sharing  the  oldest,  simplest,  dearest  indul- 
gences in  the  world,  that  we  had  got  each  other. 
When  really  we  had  lost  each  other,  lost  all  that 
mattered.  ..." 

Her  face  was  flushed  with  the  earnestness  of  her 
conviction.  Her  eyes  were  bright  with  tears. 
"Don't  think  1  don't  love  you.  It's  so  hard  to  say 
all  this.  Somehow  it  seems  like  going  back  on 
something — something  supreme.  Our  instincts 
have  got  us.  .  .  .  Don't  think  I'd  hold  myself 
from  you,  dear.    I'd  give  myself  to  you  with  both 

hands.    I  love  you When  a  woman  loves — I 

at  any  rate — she  loves  altogether.  But  this  thing 
— I  am  convinced  cannot  be.  I  must  go.my  own 
way,  the  way  I  have  to  go.  My  father  is  the 
Btrangesl  man,  obstinate,  more  than  half  a  savage. 
For  me — I  know  it — he  has  the  jealousy  of  ten 
husbands,     [f  you  take  me [f  our  secret  be- 


236        SECRET  PLACES  OP  THE  HEART 

comes  manifest If  you  are  to  take  me  and 

keep  me,  then  his  life  and  your  life  will  become 
wholly  this  Feud,  nothing  but  this  Feud.  You  have 
to  fight  him  anyhow — that  is  why  I  of  all  people 
must  keep  out  of  the  quarrel.  For  him,  it  would 
be  an  immense  excitement,  full  of  the  possibility 
of  fierce  satisfactions ;  for  you,  whether  you  won 
me  or  lost  me,  it  would  be  utter  waste  and  ruin." 

She  paused  and  then  went  on: —  "And  for  me 
too,  waste  and  ruin.  I  shall  be  a  woman  fought 
over.  I  shall  be  fought  over  as  dogs  fight  over  a 
bone.  I  shall  sink  back  to  the  level  of  Helen  of 
Troy.  I  shall  cease  to  be  a  free  citizen,  a  respon- 
sible free  person.  Whether  you  win  me  or  lose  me 
it  will  be  waste  and  ruin  for  us  both.  Your  Fuel 
Commission  will  go  to  pieces,  all  the  wide,  endur- 
ing work  you  have  set  me  dreaming  about  will  go 
the  same  way.  We  shall  just  be  another  romantic 
story.  .  .  .  No!" 

Sir  Richmond  sat  still,  a  little  like  a  sullen 
child,  she  thought.  "I  hate  all  this,"  he  said 
slowly.  "I  didn't  think  of  your  father  before,  and 
now  I  think  of  him  it  sets  me  bristling  for  a  fight. 
It  makes  all  this  harder  to  give  up.  And  yet,  do 
ycru  know,  in  the  night  I  was  thinking,  I  was  com- 
ing to  conclusions,  very  like  yours.     For  quite 

other  reasons.     I  thought  we  ought  not  to 

We  have  to  keep  friends  anyhow  and  hear  of  each 
other?" 

"That  goes  without  saying." 


FULL  MOON  237 

"I  thought  we  ought  not  to  go  on  to  be  lovers 
in  any  way  that  would  affect  you,  touch  you  too 
closely.  ...  I  was  sorry — I  had  kissed  you." 

"Not  I.  No.  Don't  be  sorry  for  that.  I  am 
glad  we  have  fallen  in  love,  more  glad  than  I  have 
been  of  anything  else  in  my  life,  and  glad  we  have 
spoken  plainly.  .  .  .  Though  we  have  to  part.  .  .  . 
And " 

Her  whisper  came  close  to  him.  "For  a  whole 
day  yet,  all  round  the  clock  twice,  you  and  I  have 
one  another." 

Miss  Seyffert  began  speaking  as  soon  as  she  was 
well  within  earshot. 

1 1 1  don 't  know  the  name  of  a  single  one  of  these 
flowers,"  she  cried,  "except  the  bluebells.  Look 
at  this  great  handful  I've  gotten!  Springtime  in 
Italy  doesn't  compare  with  it,  not  for  a  moment." 


§5 

Because  Belinda  Seyffert  was  in  the  dicky  be- 
hind them  with  her  alert  interest  in  their  emo- 
tions all  loo  thinly  ;m<l  obviously  veiled,  it  seemed 
more  convenient  to  Sir  Richmond  and  Miss  Gram- 
mont  to  talk  not  of  themselves  but  of  iwan  and 
Woman  and  of  thai  W\v  Age  according  to  the 
prophel     MartiiM'.'in,    which    Sir    Richmond     had 

partly  described  and  mainly  invented  and  ascribed 

to  his  departed  friend.    They  talked  anthropolog- 


238        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

ically,  philosophically,  speculatively,  with  an  ab- 
surd pretence  of  detachment,  they  sat  side  by  side 
in  the  little  car,  scarcely  glancing  at  one  another, 
but  side  by  side  and  touching  each  other,  and  all 
the  while  they  were  filled  with  tenderness  and 
love  and  hunger  for  one  another. 

In  the  course  of  a  day  or  so  they  had  touched 
on  nearly  every  phase  in  the  growth  of  Man  and 
Woman  from  that  remote  and  brutish  past  which 
has  left  its  traces  in  human  bones  mingled  with 
the  bones  of  hyaenas  and  cave  bears  beneath  the 
stalagmites  of  Wookey  Hole  near  Wells.  In  those 
nearly  forgotten  days  the  mind  of  man  and 
woman  had  been  no  more  than  an  evanescent  suc- 
cession of  monstrous  and  infantile  imaginations. 
That  brief  journey  in  the  west  country  had  lit  up 
phase  after  phase  in  the  long  teaching  and  dis- 
cipline of  man  as  he  had  developed  depth  of 
memory  and  fixity  of  purpose  out  of  these  raw 
beginnings,  through  the  dreaming  childhood  of 
Avebury  and  Stonehenge  and  the  crude  boyhood 
of  ancient  wars  and  massacres.  Sir  Richmond 
recalled  those  phases  now,  and  how,  as  they  had 
followed  one  another,  man's  idea  of  woman  and 
woman's  idea  of  man  had  changed  with  them, 
until  nowadays  in  the  minds  of  civilized  men  brute 
desire  and  possession  and  a  limitless  jealousy  had 
become  almost  completely  overlaid  by  the  desire 
for  fellowship  and  a  free  mutual  loyalty.  ' '  Over- 
laid," he  said.  "The  older  passions  are  still  there 


FULL  MOON  239 

like  the  fires  in  an  engine."  He  invented  a  saying 
for  Dr.  Martineau  that  the  Man  in  us  to-day  was 
still  the  old  man  of  Palaeolithic  times,  with  his 
will,  his  wrath  against  the  universe  increased 
rather  than  diminished.  If  to-day  he  ceases  to 
crack  his  brother's  bones  and  rape  and  bully  his 
womenkind,  it  is  because  he  has  grown  up  to  a 
greater  game  and  means  to  crack  this  world  and 
feed  upon  its  marrow  and  wrench  their  secrets 
from  the  stars. 

And  furthermore  it  would  seem  that  the  prophet 
Martineau  had  declared  that  in  this  New  Age  that 
was  presently  to  dawn  for  mankind,  jealousy  was 
to  be  disciplined  even  as  we  had  disciplined  lust 
and  anger ;  instead  of  ruling  our  law  it  was  to  |?e 
ruled  by  law  and  custom.  No  longer  were  the 
jealousy  of  strange  peoples,  the  jealousy  of  owner- 
ship and  the  jealousy  of  sex  to  determine  the 
framework  of  human  life.  There  was  to  be  one 
peace  and  law  throughout  the  world,  one  economic 
Bcheme  and  a  universal  freedom  for  men  and 
women  to  possess  and  give  themselves. 

''And  how  many  generations  yet  must  there  be 
before  we  reach  that  Utopia?"  Miss  Grammont 
asked. 

"I  wouldn't  pnl  ii  a1  a  very  great  distance." 

" Bui  think  of  ;i!l  the  confusions  of  the  world!" 

"Confusions  merely.    The  world  is  just  a  mud- 

die  of  stales  and  religions  and  theories  and  stu- 

pidities.     Tlu-re   are   L-i-eal    lumps   of  disorderly 


240        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

strength  in  it,  but  as  a  whole  it  is  a  weak  world. 
It  goes  on  by  habit.  There's  no  great  idea  in 
possession  and  the  only  possible  great  idea  is  this 
one.  The  New  Age  may  be  nearer  than  we  dare 
to  suppose." 

4 'If  I  could  believe  that!" 

"There  are  many  more  people  think  as  we  do 
than  you  suppose.  Are  you  and  I  such  very 
strange  and  wonderful  and  exceptional  people?" 

"No.    I  don't  think  so." 

"And  yet  the  New  World  is  already  completely 
established  in  our  hearts.  What  has  been  done  in 
our  minds  can  be  done  in  most  minds.  In  a  little 
while  the  muddled  angry  mind  of  Man  upon  his 
Planet  will  grow  clear  and  it  will  be  this  idea  that 
will  have  made  it  clear.  And  then  life  will  be 
very  different  for  everyone.  That  tyranny  of 
disorder  which  oppresses  every  life  on  earth  now 
will  be  lifted.  There  will  be  less  and  less  insecur- 
ity, less  and  less  irrational  injustice.  It  will 
be  a  better  instructed  and  a  better  behaved 
world.  We  shall  live  at  our  ease,  not  perpetually 
anxious,  not  resentful  and  angry.  And  that  will 
alter  all  the  rules  of  love.  Then  we  shall  think 
more  of  the  loveliness  of  other  people  because  it 
will  no  longer  be  necessary  to  think  so  much  of 
the  dangers  and  weaknesses  and  pitifulnesses  of 
other  people.  We  shall  not  have  to  think  of  those 
who  depend  upon  us  for  happiness  and  self- 
respect.    We  shall  not  have  to  choose  between  a 


FULL  MOON  241 

wasteful  fight  for  a  personal  end  or  the  surrender 
of  our  heart's  desire.' ' 

"Heart's  desire,"  she  whispered.  "Am  I  in- 
deed your  heart's  desire?" 

Sir  Richmond  sank  his  head  and  voice  in 
response. 

"You  are  the  best  of  all  things.  And  I  have  to 
let  you  go." 

Sir  Richmond  suddenly  remembered  Miss  Seyf- 
fert  and  half  turned  his  face  towards  her.  Her 
forehead  was  just  visible  over  the  hood  of  the  open 
coupe.  She  appeared  to  be  intelligently  intent 
upon  the  scenery.  Then  he  broke  out  suddenly 
into  a  tirade  against  the  world.  "But  I  am  bored 
by  this  jostling  unreasonable  world.  At  the  bot- 
tom of  my  heart  I  am  bitterly  resentful  to-day. 
This  is  a  world  of  fools  and  brutes  in  which  we 
live,  a  world  of  idiotic  traditions,  imbecile  limita- 
tions, cowardice,  habit,  greed  and  mean  cruelty. 
It  is  a  slum  of  a  world,  a  congested  district,  an  in- 
sanitary jumble  of  souls  and  bodies.  Every  good 
thing,  every  sweet  desire  LB  thwarted — every  one. 
I  have  to  lead  the  life  of  a  slum  missionary,  a  sani- 
tary inspector,  an  underpaid  teacher.  I  am  bored. 
( )h  God !  how  I  am  bored !  I  am  bored  by  our  laws 
and  customs.  I  am  bored  by  our  rotten  empire 
and  Its  empty  monarchy.  I  am  bored  by  its  pa- 
rades  and  its  flags  and  its  sham  enthusiasms.  I 
am  bon-d  hy  London  and  Its  life,  by  its  smart 
life  and  by  its  servile  life  alike.     I  am  bored  by 


242         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

theatres  and  by  books  and  by  every  sort  of  thing 
that  people  call  pleasure.  I  am  bored  by  the  brag 
of  people  and  the  claims  of  people  and  the  feelings 
of  people.  Damn  people!  I  am  bored  by  profi- 
teers and  by  the  snatching  they  call  business  enter- 
prise. Damn  every  business  man!  I  am  bored 
by  politics  and  the  universal  mismanagement  of 
everything.  I  am  bored  by  France,  by  Anglo- 
Saxondom,  by  German  self-pity,  by  Bolshevik 
fanaticism.  I  am  bored  by  these  fools'  squabbles 
that  devastate  the  world.  I  am  bored  by  Ireland, 
Orange  and  Green.  Curse  the  Irish — north  and 
south  together!  Lord!  how  I  hate  the  Irish  from 
Carson  to  the  last  Sinn  Feiner !  And  I  am  bored 
by  India  and  by  Egypt.  I  am  bored  by  Poland 
and  by  Islam.  I  am  bored  by  anyone  who  pro- 
fesses to  have  rights.  Damn  their  rights !  Curse 
their  rights !  I  am  bored  to  death  by  this  year  and 
by  last  year  and  by  the  prospect  of  next  year.  I 
am  bored — I  am  horribly  bored — by  my  work.  I 
am  bored  by  every  sort  of  renunciation.  I  want 
to  live  with  the  woman  I  love  and  I  want  to  work 

within  the  limits  of  my  capacity.     Curse  all 

Hullo !  Damn  his  eyes ! — Steady,  ah !  The  spark ! 
.  .  .  Good!    Xo  skid." 

He  had  come  round  a  corner  at  five  and  twenty 
miles  an  hour  and  had  stopped  his  spark  and 
pulled  up  neatly  within  a  yard  of  the  fore-wheel  of 
a  waggon  that  was  turning  in  the  road  so  as  to 
block  the  way  completely. 


FULL  MOON  243 

"That  almost  had  me.  .  .  ." 

"And  now  you  feel  better?"  said  Miss  Gram- 
mont. 

"Ever  so  much,"  said  Sir  Richmond  and 
chuckled. 

The  waggoner  cleared  the  road  and  the  car 
started  up  again. 

For  a  minute  or  so  neither  spoke. 

"You  ought  to  be  smacked  hard  for  that  out- 
break,— my  dear,"  said  Miss  Grammont. 

"I  ought — my  dear.  I  have  no  right  to  be  ill- 
tempered.  We  two  are  among  the  supremely  for- 
tunate ones  of  our  time.  We  have  no  excuse  for 
misbehaviour.  Got  nothing  to  grumble  at.  Al- 
ways I  am  lucky.  That — with  the  waggon — was  a 
very  near  thing.    God  spoils  us. 

"We  two,"  he  went  on,  after  a  pause,  "are 
among  the  most  fortunate  people  alive.  We  are 
both  rich  and  easily  rich.  That  gives  us  freedoms 
few  people  have.  We  have  a  vision  of  the  whole 
world  in  which  we  live.  It's  in  a  mess — but  that 
is  by  the  way.  The  mass  of  mankind  never  gets 
enough  education  to  have  even  a  glimpse  of  the 
world  as  a  whole  They  never  gel  a  chance  to  get 
the  hang  of  it.  W  is  really  possible  for  as  to  do 
things  that  will  mailer  in  the  world.  All  our  time 
is  our  own;  all  our  abilities  we  are  free  to  use. 
Most  people,  most  intelligent  and  educated  people, 
are  caught  in  cages  of  pecuniary  necessity;  they 
are  tied  to  tasks  they  can't  leave,  they  are  driven 


244        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

and  compelled  and  limited  by  circumstances  they 
can  never  master.  But  we,  if  we  have  tasks, 
have  tasks  of  our  own  choosing.  We  may  not  like 
the  world,  but  anyhow  we  are  free  to  do  our  best 
to  alter  it.  If  I  were  a  clerk  in  Hoxton  and  you 
were  a  city  typist,  then  we  might  swear. ' ' 

"It  was  you  who  swore,"  smiled  Miss  Gram- 
mont. 

"It's  the  thought  of  that  clerk  in  Hoxton  and 
that  city  typist  who  really  keep  me  at  my  work. 
Any  smacking  ought  to  come  from  them.  I 
couldn't  do  less  than  I  do  in  the  face  of  their  help- 
lessness. Nevertheless  a  day  will  come — through 
what  we  do  and  what  we  refrain  from  doing — 
when  there  will  be  no  bound  and  limited  clerks 
in  Hoxton  and  no  captive  typists  in  the  city.  And 
nobody  at  all  to  consider." 

"According  to  the  prophet  Martineau,"  said 
Miss  Grammont. 

"And  then  you  and  I  must  contrive  to  be  born 
again. ' ' 

"Heighho!"  cried  Miss  Grammont.  "A  thou- 
sand years  ahead!  When  fathers  are  civilized. 
When  all  these  phanton  people  who  intervene  on 
your  side — no!  I  don't  want  to  know  anything 
about  them,  but  I  know  of  them  by  instinct — when 
they  also  don't  matter." 

' '  Then  you  and  I  can  have  things  out  with  each 
other — thoroughly,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  with  a 


FULL  MOON  245 

surprising  ferocity  in  his  voice,  charging  the  little 
hill  before  him  as  though  he  charged  at  Time. 


§6 

They  had  to  wait  at  Nailsworth  for  a  telegram 
from  Mr.  Grammont's  agents;  they  lunched  there 
and  drove  on  to  Bath  in  the  afternoon.  They 
came  into  the  town  through  unattractive  and  un- 
worthy outskirts,  and  only  realized  the  charm  of 
the  place  after  they  had  garaged  their  car  at  the 
Pulteney  Hotel  and  walked  back  over  the  Pulteney 
Bridge  to  see  the  Avon  and  the  Pump  Koom  and 
the  Roman  Baths.  The  Pulteney  they  found  hung 
with  pictures  and  adorned  with  sculpture  to  an 
astonishing  extent;  some  former  proprietor  must 
have  had  a  mania  for  replicas  and  the  place  is 
eventful  with  white  marble  fauns  and  sylphs  and 
lions  and  Cinsars  and  Queen  Victorias  and  packed 
like  an  exhibition  with  memories  of  Rome,  Flor- 
ence, Milan,  Paris,  the  National  Gallery  and  the 
Royal  Academy,  amidst  which  splendours  a  com- 
petent staff'  administers  modern  comforts  with 
an  old-fashioned  civility.  But  round  and  nbout 
the  Pulteney  oik;  has  si  ill  the  scenery  of  Georgian 
England,  the  white,  faintly  classical  terraces  and 
houses  of  the  days  <>!'  Kidding,  Smollett,  Fanny 
Burney  and  Jane  Austen,  the  graceful  bridge  with 

the   bright   little    shops   full   of    "presents    from 


246         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Bath";  the  Pump  Room  with  its  water  drinkers 
and  a  fine  array  of  the  original  Bath  chairs. 

Down  below  the  Pump  Room  our  travellers  ex- 
plored the  memories  of  the  days  when  the  world 
was  Latin  from  York  to  the  Tigris,  and  the  Cor- 
inthian capital  flourished  like  a  weed  from  Bath 
to  Baalbek.  And  they  considered  a  little  doubt- 
fully the  seventeenth  century  statue  of  Bladud, 
who  is  said  to  have  been  healed  by  the  Bath  waters 
and  to  have  founded  the  city  in  the  days  when 
Stonehenge  still  flourished,  eight  hundred  years 
before  the  Romans  came. 

In  the  afternoon  Miss  Seyffert  came  with  Sir 
Richmond  and  Miss  Grammont  and  was  very  en- 
thusiastic about  everything,  but  in  the  evening 
after  dinner  it  was  clear  that  her  role  was  to  re- 
main in  the  hotel.  Sir  Richmond  and  Miss  Gram- 
mont went  out  into  the  moonlit  gloaming;  they 
crossed  the  bridge  again  and  followed  the  road 
beside  the  river  towards  the  old  Abbey  Church, 
that  Lantern  of  the  West.  Away  in  some  sunken 
gardens  ahead  of  them  a  band  was  playing,  and  a 
cluster  of  little  lights  about  the  bandstand  showed 
a  crowd  of  people  down  below  dancing  on  the 
grass.  These  little  lights,  these  bobbing  black 
heads  and  the  lilting  music,  this  little  inflamed 
centre  of  throbbing  sounds  and  ruddy  illumina- 
tion, made  the  dome  of  the  moonlit  world  about  it 
seem  very  vast  and  cool  and  silent.  Our  visitors 
began  to  realize  that  Bath  could  be  very  beautiful. 


FULL  MOON  247 

They  went  to  the  parapet  above  the  river  and 
stood  there,  leaning  over  it  elbow  to  elbow  and 
smoking  cigarettes.  Miss  Grammont  was  moved 
to  declare  the  Pulteney  Bridge,  with  its  noble 
arch,  its  effect  of  height  over  the  swirling  river, 
and  the  cluster  of  houses  above,  more  beautiful 
than  the  Ponte  Vecchio  at  Florence.  Down  below 
was  a  man  in  waders  with  a  fishing-rod  going  to 
and  fro  along  the  foaming  weir,  and  a  couple  of 
boys  paddled  a  boat  against  the  rush  of  the  water 
lower  down  the  stream. 

"Dear  England!"  said  Miss  Grammont,  sur- 
veying this  gracious  spectacle.  "How  full  it  is  of 
homely  and  lovely  and  kindly  things!" 

"It  is  the  home  we  come  from." 

"You  belong  to  it  still." 

"No  more  than  you  do.  I  belong  to  a  big  over- 
working modern  place  called  London  which 
stretches  its  tentacles  all  over  the  world.  I  am  as 
much  a  home-coming  tourist  as  you  are.  Most  of 
this  western  country  I  am  seeing  for  the  first 
time." 

She  said  nothing  for  a  space.  "I've  not  a  word 
to  Bay  to  night,"  she  said.  "I'm  just  full  of  a 
sorl  of  animal  satisfaction  in  being  close  to  you. 
.  .  .  And  in  being  with  you  among  lovely  things. 
.  .  .Somewhere Before  we  part  to-night — 

•     •     • 

"Yes?"  he  said  to  her  pause,  and  his  face  came 
very  near  to  hers. 


248        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"I  want  you  to  kiss  me." 

"Yes,"  he  said  awkwardly,  glancing  over  his 
shoulder,  acutely  aware  of  the  promenaders  pass- 
ing close  to  them. 

"It's  a  promise?" 

"Yes." 

Very  timidly  and  guiltily  his  hand  sought  hers 
beside  it  and  gripped  it  and  pressed  it.  "My 
dear!"  he  whispered,  tritest  and  most  unavoid- 
able of  expressions.  It  was  not  very  like  Man 
and  Woman  loving  upon  their  Planet ;  it  was  much 
more  like  the  shy  endearments  of  the  shop  boys 
and  work  girls  who  made  the  darkling  populous 
about  them  with  their  silent  interchanges. 

"There  are  a  thousand  things  I  want  to  talk 
about  to  you,"  she  said.  "After  we  have  parted 
to-morrow  I  shall  begin  to  think  of  them.  But  now 
— every  rational  thing  seems  dissolved  in  this 
moonlight.".  .  . 

Presently  she  made  an  effort  to  restore  the  in- 
tellectual dignity  of  their  relationship. 

"I  suppose  I  ought  to  be  more  concerned  to- 
night about  the  work  I  have  to  do  in  the  world  and 
anxious  for  you  to  tell  me  this  and  that,  but  in- 
deed I  am  not  concerned  at  all  about  it.  I  seem  to 
have  it  in  outline  all  perfectly  clear.  I  mean  to 
play  a  man 's  part  in  the  world  just  as  my  father 
wants  me  to  do.  I  mean  to  win  his  confidence  and 
work  with  him — like  a  partner.  Then  some  day 
I  shall  be  a  power  in  the  world  of  fuel.    And  at 


FULL  MOON  249 

the  same  time  I  must  watch  and  read  and  think 
and  learn  how  to  be  the  servant  of  the  world.  .  .  . 
We  two  have  to  live  like  trusted  servants  who  have 
been  made  guardians  of  a  helpless  minor.  We 
have  to  put  things  in  order  and  keep  them  in 
order  against  the  time  when  Man — Man  whom  we 
call  in  America  the  Common  Man — can  take  hold 
of  his  world " 

"And  release  his  servants,"  said  Sir  Rich- 
mond. 

"All  that  is  perfectly  clear  in  my  mind.  That 
is  what  I  am  going  to  live  for ;  that  is  what  I  have 
to  do." 

She  stopped  abruptly.  "All  that  is  about  as 
interesting  to-night — in  comparison  with  the  touch 
of  your  dear  fingers — as  next  month's  railway 
time-table." 

But  later  she  found  a  topic  that  could  hold 
their  attention  for  a  time. 

"We  have  never  said  a  word  about  religion," 
she  said. 

Sir  Richmond  paused  for  a  moment.  "I  am  a 
godless  man,"  he  said.  "The  stars  and  space 
and  time  overwhelm  my  imagination.  I  cannot 
imagine  anything  above  or  beyond  them." 

She  thought  that  over.  "But  there  are  divine 
tilings,"  she  said. 

"You  are  divine.  .  .  .  T'm  not  talking  lovers' 
nonsense."  he  hastened  to  add.  "T  mean  that 
there  is  something  about  human  beings — not  just 


250    SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

the  everyday  stuff  of  them,  but  something  that 
appears  intermittently — as  though  a  light  shone 
through  something  translucent.  If  I  believe  in 
any  divinity  at  all  it  is  a  divinity  revealed  to  me 

by  other  people And  even  by  myself  in  my 

own  heart. 

''I'm  never  surprised  at  the  badness  of  human 
beings,"  said  Sir  Richmond;  "seeing  how  they 
have  come  about  and  what  they  are;  but  I  have 
been  surprised  time  after  time  by  fine  things.  .  .  . 
Often  in  people  I  disliked  or  thought  little  of .  .  .  . 
I  can  understand  that  I  find  you  full  of  divine 
quality,  because  I  am  in  love  with  you  and  all 
alive  to  you.  Necessarily  I  keep  on  discovering 
loveliness  in  you.  But  I  have  seen  divine  things — 
in  dear  old  Martineau,  for  example.  A  vain  man, 
fussy,  timid — and  yet  filled  with  a  passion  for 
truth,  ready  to  make  great  sacrifices  and  to  toil 
tremendously  for  that.  And  in  those  men  I  am 
always  cursing,  my  Committee,  it  is  astonishing 
at  times  to  discover  what  streaks  of  goodness 
even  the  really  bad  men  can  show.  .  .  .  But  one 
can't  make  use  of  just  anyone's  divinity.  I  can 
see  the  divinity  in  Martineau  but  it  leaves  me  cold. 
He  tired  me  and  bored  me.  .  .  .  But  I  live  on  you. 
It's  only  through  love  that  the  God  can  reach  over 
from  one  human  being  to  another.  All  real  love 
is  a  divine  thing,  a  reassurance,  a  release  of  cour- 
age. It  is  wonderful  enough  that  we  should  take 
food  and  drink  and  turn  them  into  imagination, 


FULL  MOON  251 

invention  and  creative  energy ;  it  is  still  more  won- 
derful that  we  should  take  an  animal  urging  and 
turn  it  into  a  light  to  discover  beauty  and  an  im- 
pulse towards  the  utmost  achievements  of  which 
we  are  capable.  All  love  is  a  sacrament  and  all 
lovers  are  priests  to  each  other.    You  and  I " 

Sir  Richmond  broke  off  abruptly.  "I  spent 
three  days  trying  to  tell  this  to  Dr.  Martineau. 
But  he  wasn't  the  priest  I  had  to  confess  to  and 
the  words  wouldn't  come.  I  can  confess  it  to  you 
readily  enough.  ..." 

"I  cannot  tell,"  said  Miss  Grammont,  " whether 
this  is  the  last  wisdom  in  life  or — moonshine.  I 
cannot  tell  whether  I  am  thinking  or  feeling;  but 
the  noise  of  the  water  going  over  the  weir  below  is 
like  the  stir  in  my  heart.  And  I  am  swimming  in 
love  and  happiness.  Am  I  awake  or  am  I  dream- 
ing you,  and  are  we  dreaming  one  another?  Hold 
my  hand — hold  it  hard  and  tight.  I'm  trembling 
with  love  for  you  and  all  the  world.  ...  If  I  say 
more  I  shall  be  weeping." 

For  a  long  time  they  stood  side  by  side  saying 
not  a  word  to  one  another. 

Presently  the  band  down  below  and  the  dancing 
ceased  and  the  little  lights  were  extinguished.  The 
silent  moon  seemed  to  grow  brighter  and  larger 
and  the  whisper  of  the  waters  louder.  A  crowd  of 
young  people  flowed  out  of  the  gardens  and  passed 
by  on  their  way  home.  Sir  Richmond  and  Miss 
Grammonl  Btrolled  throng!  the  dispersing  crowd 


252        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

and  over  the  Toll  Bridge  and  went  exploring  down 
a  little  staircase  that  went  down  from  the  end 
of  the  bridge  to  the  dark  river,  and  then  came  back 
to  their  old  position  at  the  parapet  looking  upon 
the  weir  and  the  Pulteney  Bridge.  The  gardens 
that  had  been  so  gay  were  already  dark  and  silent 
as  they  returned,  and  the  streets  echoed  emptily 
to  the  few  people  who  were  still  abroad. 

"It's  the  most  beautiful  bridge  in  the  world," 
said  Miss  Grammont,  and  gave  him  her  hand 
again. 

Some  deep-toned  clock  close  by  proclaimed  the 
hour  eleven. 

The  silence  healed  again. 

"Well?"  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"Well?"  said  Miss  Grammont  smiling  very 
faintly. 

"I  suppose  we  must  go  out  of  all  this  beauty 
now,  back  to  the  lights  of  the  hotel  and  the  watch- 
ful eyes  of  your  dragon. ' ' 

"She  has  not  been  a  very  exacting  dragon  so 
far,  has  she?" 

1 '  She  is  a  miracle  of  tact. ' ' 

' '  She  does  not  really  watch.  But  she  is  curious 
— and  very  sympathetic." 

"She  is  wonderful."  .  .  . 

"That  man  is  still  fishing,"  said  Miss  Gram- 
mont. 

For  a  time  she  peered  down  at  the  dark  figure 
wading  in  the  foam  below  as  though  it  was  the 


FULL  MOON  253 

only  thing  of  interest  in  the  world.     Then  she 
turned  to  Sir  Richmond. 

"I  would  trust  Belinda  with  my  life,"  she  said. 
"And  anyhow — now — we  need  not  worry  about 
Belinda." 


§7 

At  the  breakfast  table  it  was  Belinda  who  was 
the  most  nervous  of  the  three,  the  most  moved, 
the  most  disposed  to  throw  a  sacramental  air  over 
their  last  meal  together.  Her  companions  had 
passed  beyond  the  idea  of  separation;  it  was  as 
if  they  now  cherished  a  secret  satisfaction  at  the 
high  dignity  of  their  parting.  Belinda  in  some 
way  perceived  they  had  become  different.  They 
were  no  longer  tremulous  lovers ;  they  seemed  sure 
of  one  another  and  with  a  new  pride  in  their  bear- 
ing. It  would  have  pleased  Belinda  better,  seeing 
how  soon  they  were  to  be  torn  apart,  if  they  had 
not  made  quite  such  excellent  breakfasts.  She 
even  suspected  them  of  having  slept — well.  Yet 
yesterday  they  had  been  deeply  stirred.  Tiny 
had  stayed  out  late  lasl  night,  so  late  that  she  had 
not  heard  them  come  in.  Perhaps  then  they  had 
passed  Hie  climax  of  their  emotions.  Sir  Rich- 
mond, Bhe  Learnt,  was  to  take  the  party  to  Kxeter, 
where  there  would  be  a  train  for  Falmouth  a  little 
after  two.  If  they  started  from  Bath  about  nine 
that  would  give  them  an  ample  margin  of  time 


254        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

in  which  to  deal  with  a  puncture  or  any  such 
misadventure. 

They  crested  the  Mendips  above  Shepton  Mal- 
let, ran  through  Ilchester  and  Ilminster  into  the 
lovely  hill  country  about  Up-Ottery  and  so  to 
Honiton  and  the  broad  level  road  to  Exeter.  Sir 
Eichmond  and  Miss  Grammont  were  in  a  state  of 
happy  gravity;  they  sat  contentedly  side  by  side, 
talking  very  little.  They  had  already  made  their 
arrangements  for  writing  to  one  another.  There 
was  to  be  no  stream  of  love-letters  or  protesta- 
tions. That  might  prove  a  mutual  torment.  Their 
love  was  to  be  implicit.  They  were  to  write  at  in- 
tervals about  political  matters  and  their  common 
interests,  and  to  keep  each  other  informed  of  their 
movements  about  the  world. 

"We  shall  be  working  together,"  she  said, 
speaking  suddenly  out  of  a  train  of  thought  she 
had  been  following,  "we  shall  be  closer  together 
than  many  a  couple  who  have  never  spent  a  day 
apart  for  twenty  years." 

Then  presently  she  said :  "In  the  New  Age  all 
lovers  will  have  to  be  accustomed  to  meeting  and 
parting.  We  women  will  not  be  tied  very  much 
by  domestic  needs.  Unless  we  see  fit  to  have  chil- 
dren. We  shall  be  going  about  our  business  like 
men ;  we  shall  have  world-wide  businesses — many 
of  us — just  as  men  will.  .  .  . 

'It  will  be  a  world  full  of  lovers'  meetings. 


if 


FULL  MOON  255 

Some  day — somewhere — we  two  will  certainly 
meet  again." 

"Even  you  have  to  force  circumstances  a  lit- 
tle, ' '  said  Sir  Richmond. 

"We  shall  meet,"  she  said,  "without  doing 
that." 

1 '  But  where  ? "  he  asked  unanswered.  .  .  . 

"Meetings  and  partings,"  she  said.  "Women 
will  be  used  to  seeing  their  lovers  go  away.  Even 
to  seeing  them  go  away  to  other  women  who  have 
borne  them  children  and  who  have  a  closer  claim 
on  them." 

"No  one "  began  Sir  Richmond,  startled. 

"But  I  don't  mind  very  much.  It's  how  things 
are.  If  I  were  a  perfectly  civilized  woman  I 
shouldn't  mind  at  all.  If  men  and  women  are  not 
to  be  tied  to  each  other  there  must  needs  be  such 
things  as  this." 

"But  you,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "I  at  any  rate 
am  not  like  that.    I  cannot  bear  the  thought  that 


you 

"You  need  not  bear  it,  my  dear.  I  was  just 
trying  to  imagine  this  world  that  is  to  be.  Women 
I  think  arc  different  from  men — in  their  jealousy. 
Men  are  jealous  of  the  other  man  ;  women  are  jeal- 
ous for  their  man— and  careless  about  the  other 

woman.  What  I  love  in  you  I  am  sure  about.  My 
mind  was  empty  wlmii  it  came  to  you  and  now  it  is 
full  to  overflowing.    I  shall  feel  you  moving  about 


256        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

in  the  same  world  with  me.  I  'm  not  likely  to  think 
of  anyone  else  for  a  very  long  time.  .  .  .  Later  on, 
who  knows  ?  I  may  marry.  I  make  no  vows.  But 
I  think  until  I  know  certainly  that  you  do  not 
want  me  any  more  it  will  be  impossible  for  me  to 
marry  or  to  have  a  lover.  I  don't  know,  but 
that  is  how  I  believe  it  will  be  with  me.  And  my 
mind  feels  beautifully  clear  now  and  settled.  I've 
got  your  idea  and  made  it  my  own,  your  idea  that 
we  matter  scarcely  at  all,  but  that  the  work  we  do 
matters  supremely.  I'll  find  my  rope  and  tug  it, 
never  fear.  Half  way  round  the  world  perhaps 
some  day  you  will  feel  me  tugging. ' ' 

"I  shall  feel  you're  there,"  he  said,  " whether 
you  tug  or  not.  .  .  . 

"Three  miles  left  to  Exeter,"  he  reported 
presently. 

She  glanced  back  at  Belinda. 

"It  is  good  that  we  have  loved,  my  dear,"  she 
whispered.    "Say  it  is  good." 

"The  best  thing  in  all  my  life,"  he  said,  and 
lowered  his  head  and  voice  to  say:  "My  dearest 
dear." 

"Heart's  desire— still?" 

"Heart's  delight.  .  .  .  Priestess  of  life.  .  .  . 
Divinity." 

She  smiled  and  nodded  and  suddenly  Belinda, 
up  above  their  lowered  heads,  accidentally  and 
irrelevantly,  no  doubt,  coughed. 

At  Exeter  Station  there  was  not  very  much  time 


FULL  MOON  257 

to  spare  after  all.  Hardly  had  Sir  Richmond  se- 
cured a  luncheon  basket  for  the  two  travellers 
before  the  train  came  into  the  station.  He  parted 
from  Miss  Grammont  with  a  hand  clasp.  Belinda 
was  flushed  and  distressed  at  the  last  but  her 
friend  was  quiet  and  still.  "Au  revoir,"  said 
Belinda  without  conviction  when  Sir  Richmond 
shook  her  hand. 

§  8. 

Sir  Richmond  stood  quite  still  on  the  platform 
as  the  train  ran  out  of  the  station.  He  did  not 
move  until  it  had  disappeared  round  the  bend. 
Then  he  turned,  lost  in  a  brown  study,  and  walked 
very  slowly  towards  the  station  exit. 

"The  most  wonderful  thing  in  my  life,"  he 
thought.    "And  already — it  is  unreal. 

"She  will  go  on  to  her  father — whom  she  knows 
ten  thousand  times  more  thoroughly  than  she 
knows  me;  she  will  go  on  to  Paris,  she  will  pick 
up  all  the  11j  icads  of  her  old  story,  be  reminded 
of  endless  things  in  her  life,  but  never  except  in 
the  most  casual  way  of  these  days:  they  will  be 
cut  off  from  everything  else  thai  will  serve  to  keep 
them  real;  and  as  forme — this  connects  with  noth- 
ing else  in  my  life  at  all.  .  .  .  It  is  as  disconnected 
as  a  dream.  .  .  .  Already  it  is  hardly  more  sub- 
stantial than  a  dream.  .  .  . 

"We  shall  write  letters.  Do  letters  breathe 
faster  or  slower  as  you  read  them? 


258        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART; 

"We  may  meet. 

"Where  are  we  likely  to  meet  again?  .  .  .  1 
never  realized  before  how  improbable  it  is  that  we 
shall  meet  again.   And  if  we  meet?  .  .  . 

"Never  in  all  our  lives  shall  we  be  really  to- 
gether again.  It's  over ^With  a  complete- 
ness. .  .  . 

"Like  death.' ' 

He  came  opposite  the  bookstalls  and  stopped 
short  and  stared  with  unseeing  eyes  at  the  display 
of  popular  literature.  He  was  wondering  now 
whether  after  all  he  ought  to  have  let  her  go.  He 
experienced  something  of  the  blank  amazement  of 
a  child  who  has  burst  its  toy  balloon.  His  golden 
globe  of  satisfaction  in  an  instant  had  gone.  An 
irrational  sense  of  loss  was  flooding  every  other 
feeling  about  V.V.  If  she  had  loved  him  truly  and 
altogether  could  she  have  left  him  like  this? 
Neither  of  them  surely  had  intended  so  complete 
a  separation.  He  wanted  to  go  back  and  recall 
that  train. 

A  few  seconds  more,  he  realized,  and  he  would 
give  way  to  anger.  Whatever  happened  that  must 
not  happen.  He  pulled  himself  together.  What 
was  it  he  had  to  do  now?  He  had  not  to  be  angry, 
he  had  not  even  to  be  sorry.  They  had  done  the 
right  thing.  Outside  the  station  his  car  was 
waiting. 

He  went  outside  the  station  and  stared  at  his 
car.    He  had  to  go  somewhere.    Of  course !  down 


FULL  MOON  259 

into  Cornwall  to  Martin's  cottage.  He  had  to  go 
down  to  her  and  be  kind  and  comforting  about  that 
carbuncle.  To  be  kind?  ...  If  this  thwarted 
feeling  broke  out  into  anger  he  might  be  tempted 
to  take  it  out  of  Martin.  That  at  any  rate  he  must 
not  do.  He  had  always  for  some  inexplicable 
cause  treated  Martin  badly.  Nagged  her  and 
blamed  her  and  threatened  her.  That  must  stop 
now.  No  shadow  of  this  affair  must  lie  on  Martin. 
.  .  .  And  Martin  must  never  have  a  suspicion  of 
any  of  this.  .  .  . 

The  image  of  Martin  became  very  vivid  in  his 
mind.  He  thought  of  her  as  he  had  seen  her  many 
times,  with  the  tears  close,  fighting  with  her  back 
to  the  wall,  with  all  her  wit  and  vigour  gone,  be- 
cause she  loved  liini  more  steadfastly  than  be  did 
her.  Whatever  happened  he  must  aol  lake  it  out 
of  Martin.  Tt  was  astonishing  how  real  sin-  had 
become  now  as  V.V.  became  a  dream.  Yes, 
Martin  was  astonishingly  real.  And  if  only  he 
could  go  now  and  talk  to  Martin — and  face  all  tin' 
fads  of  lil''1  with  her,  even  as  he  had  done  with 
that  phantom  Martin  in  his  dream.  .  .  . 

lint  things  were  not  like  that. 

Be  Looked  to  Bee  if  his  car  was  short  of  water 
or  petrol;  both  needed  replenishing,  and  so  he 

would   have  to  go   np   the   hill   into    Exeter   town 
mil     Il«'  gol   into  his  <-ar  and  sal.  with  his  lin 

rs  on  tlir  eled ric  start*  p. 

Martini   old  Priendl    Eight  days  were  still  lefl 


260         SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

before  the  Committee  met  again,  eight  days  for 
golden  kindness.  He  would  distress  Martin  by  no 
clumsy  confession.  He  would  just  make  her  happy 
as  she  loved  to  be  made  happy.  .  .  .  Nevertheless. 
Nevertheless.  .  .  . 

Was  it  Martin  who  failed  him  or  he  who  failed 
Martin? 

Incessant  and  insoluble  dispute.  Well,  the  thing 
now  was  to  go  to  Martin.  .  .  .  And  then  the  work ! 

He  laughed  suddenly. 

1 *  I  '11  take  it  out  of  the  damned  Commission.  I  '11 
make  old  Rumf ord  Brown  sit  up. ' ' 

He  was  astonished  to  find  himself  thinking  of 
the  affairs  of  the  Commission  with  a  lively  interest 
and  no  trace  of  fatigue.  He  had  had  his  change ; 
he  had  taken  "his  rest ;  he  was  equal  to  his  task 
again  already.  He  started  his  engine  and  steered 
his  way  past  a  van  and  a  waiting  cab. 

" Fuel, "he  said. 


CHAPTER  THE  NINTH 
The  Last  Days  of  Sir  Richmond  Hardy 

The  Majority  and  Minority  Reports  of  the  Fuel 
Commission  were  received  on  their  first  publica- 
tion with  much  heat  and  disputation,  but  there  is 
already  a  fairly  general  agreement  that  they  are 
great  and  significant  documents,  broadly  con- 
ceived and  historically  important.  They  do  lift 
the  questions  of  fuel  supply  and  distribution  high 
above  the  level  of  parochial  jealousies  and  above 
the  petty  and  destructive  profiteering  of  private 
owners  and  traders,  to  a  view  of  a  general  human 
welfare.  They  form  an  important  link  in  a  series 
of  private  and  public  documents  that  are  slowly 
opening  out  a  prospect  of  new  economic  methods, 
methods  conceived  in  the  generous  spirit  of  scien- 
tific work,  thai  may  yet  arrest  the  drift  of  our 
western  civilization  towards  financial  and  commer- 
cial squalor  and  the  social  collapse  that  must  ensue 
inevitably  on  that.  In  view  of  the  composition  of 
the  Committee,  the  Majority  Eteporl  is  in  itself  an 
amazing  triumph  of  Sir  Richmond's  views;  it  is 

261 


262        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

astonishing  that  he  was  able  to  drive  his  opponents 
so  far  and  then  leave  them  there  securely  ad- 
vanced while  he  carried  on  the  adherents  he  had 
altogether  won,  including,  of  course,  the  labour 
representatives,  to  the  further  altitudes  of  the 
Minority  Report. 

After  the  summer  recess  the  Majority  Report 
was  discussed  and  adopted.  Sir  Richmond  had 
shown  signs  of  flagging  energy  in  June,  but  he 
had  come  back  in  September  in  a  state  of  excep- 
tional vigour ;  for  a  time  he  completely  dominated 
the  Committee  by  the  passionate  force  of  his  con- 
victions and  the  illuminating  scorn  he  brought  to 
bear  on  the  various  subterfuges  and  weakening 
amendments  by  which  the  meaner  interests  sought 
to  save  themselves  in  whole  or  in  part  from  the 
common  duty  of  sacrifice.  But  toward  the  end  he 
fell  ill.  He  had  worked  to  the  pitch  of  exhaustion. 
He  neglected  a  cold  that  settled  on  his  chest.  He 
began  to  cough  persistently  and  betray  an  increas- 
ingly irritable  temper.  In  the  last  fights  in  the 
Committee  his  face  was  bright  with  fever  and  he 
spoke  in  a  voiceless  whisper,  often  a  vast  angry 
whisper.  His  place  at  table  was  marked  with 
scattered  lozenges  and  scraps  of  paper  torn  to  the 
minutest  shreds.  Such  good  manners  as  had  hith- 
erto mitigated  his  behaviour  on  the  Committee  de- 
parted from  him.  He  carried  his  last  points,  ges- 
ticulating and  coughing  and  wheezing  rather  than 
speaking.    But  he  had  so  hammered  his  ideas  into 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    263 

the  Committee  that  they  took  the  effect  of  what  he 
was  trying  to  say. 

He  died  of  pneumonia  at  his  own  house  three 
days  after  the  passing  of  the  Majority  Report. 
The  Minority  Report,  his  own  especial  creation, 
he  never  signed.  It  was  completed  by  Wast  and 
Carmichael.  ... 

After  their  parting  at  Salisbury  station  Dr. 
Martineau  heard  very  little  of  Sir  Richmond  for 
a  time  except  through  the  newspapers,  which  con- 
tained frequent  allusions  to  the  Committee. 
Someone  told  him  that  Sir  Richmond  had  been 
staying  at  Ruan  in  Cornwall  where  Martin  Leeds 
had  a  cottage,  and  someone  else  had  met  him  at 
Bath  on  his  way,  ho  said,  in  his  car  from  Cornwall 
to  a  conference  with  Sir  Peter  Davies  in  Glamor- 
ganshire. 

But  in  the  interim  Dr.  Martineau  had  the  pleas- 
ure of  meeting  Lady  Hardy  al  a  luncheon  party. 
He  was  seated  nexl  to  her  and  he  found  her  a  very 
pleasing  and  sympathetic  person  indeed.  She 
talked  to  him  freely  and  simply  of  her  husband 
and  of  the  journey  the  two  men  had  taken 
ether.  Either  she  knew  nothing  of  the  circum- 
stances of  their  parting  or  if  she  did  she  did  not 
betray  her  knowledge.  "Thai  holiday  did  him  a 
world  of  good,"  she  said.  "He  came  hack  to  his 
work  like  a  giant.    I  feel  very  grateful  to  yon." 

Dr.  Martineau  said  if  was  a  pleasure  to  have 
helped  Sir  Richmond's  work  in  any  way.    lie  be- 


264        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

lieved  in  him  thoroughly.  Sir  Richmond  was  in- 
spired by  great  modern  creative  ideas. 

"Forgive  me  if  I  keep  you  talking  about  him," 
said  Lady  Hardy.  "I  wish  I  could  feel  as  sure 
that  I  had  been  of  use  to  him." 

Dr.  Martineau  insisted.  "I  know  very  well  that 
you  are." 

"I  do  what  I  can  to  help  him  carry  his  enormous 
burthen  of  toil"  she  said.  "I  try  to  smooth  his 
path.  But  he  is  a  strange  silent  creature  at 
times." 

Her  eyes  scrutinized  the  doctor's  face. 

It  was  not  the  doctor's  business  to  supplement 
Sir  Richmond's  silences.  Yet  he  wished  to  meet 
the  requirements  of  this  lady  if  he  could.  ' '  He  is 
one  of  those  men,"  he  said,  "who  are  driven  by 
forces  they  do  not  fully  understand.  A  man  of 
genius." 

"Yes,"  she  said  in  an  undertone  of  intimacy. 
"Genius.  ...  A  great  irresponsible  genius.  .  .  . 
Difficult  to  help.  ...  I  wish  I  could  do  more  for 
him." 

A  very  sweet  and  charming  lady.  It  was  with 
great  regret  that  the  doctor  found  the  time  had 
come  to  turn  to  his  left-hand  neighbour. 

§  2 

It  was  with  some  surprise  that  Dr.  Martineau 
received  a  fresh  appeal  for  aid  from  Sir  Rich- 
mond.   It  was  late  in  October  and  Sir  Richmond 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY     265 

was  already  seriously  ill.  But  he  was  still  going 
about  his  business  as  though  he  was  perfectly 
well.  He  had  not  mistaken  his  man.  Dr.  Marti- 
neau  received  him  as  though  there  had  never  been 
a  shadow  of  offence  between  them. 

He  came  straight  to  the  point.  * '  Martineau, " 
he  said,  "I  must  have  those  drugs  I  asked  you 
for  when  first  I  came  to  you  now.  I  must  be  bol- 
stered up.  I  can 't  last  out  unless  I  am.  I  'm  at  the 
end  of  my  energy.  I  come  to  you  because  you  will 
understand.  The  Commission  can't  go  on  now  for 
more  than  another  three  weeks.  Whatever  hap- 
pens afterwards  I  must  keep  going  until  then." 

The  doctor  did  understand.  He  made  no  vain 
objections.  He  did  what  he  could  to  patch  up  his 
friend  for  his  last  struggles  with  the  opposition 
in  the  Committee.  "Pro  forma,"  he  said,  stetho- 
scope in  hand,  "I  must  order  you  to  bed.  You 
won't  go.  But  I  order  you.  You  must  know  that 
what  you  are  doing  is  risking  your  life.  Your 
lungs  are  congested,  the  bronchial  tubes  already. 
That  may  spread  at  any  time.  If  this  open 
weather  lasts  yon  may  go  about  and  still  pull 
through.  Bui  at  any  time  this  may  pass  into 
pneumonia.  And  there's  not  much  in  you  jnst 
now  to  stand  up  against  pneumonia.  ..." 

"I'll  take  all  reasonable  care." 

"Is  your  wife  al  home?" 

"She  is  in  Wales  with  her  people.  But  the 
household  is  well  trained.    I  can  manage." 


266        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"Go  in  a  closed  car  from  door  to  door.  Wrap 
up  like  a  mummy.  I  wish  the  Committee  room 
wasn't  down  those  abominable  House  of  Com- 
mons corridors.  ..." 

They  parted  with  an  affectionate  handshake. 

§  3 

Death  approved  of  Sir  Richmond's  determina- 
tion to  see  the  Committee  through.  Our  universal 
creditor  gave  this  particular  debtor  grace  to  the 
very  last  meeting.  Then  he  brushed  a  gust  of 
chilly  rain  across  the  face  of  Sir  Richmond  as  he 
stood  waiting  for  his  car  outside  the  strangers' 
entrance  to  the  House.  For  a  couple  of  days  Sir 
Richmond  felt  almost  intolerably  tired,  but 
scarcely  noted  the  changed  timbre  of  the  wheezy 
notes  in  his  throat.  He  rose  later  each  day  and 
with  ebbing  vigour,  jotted  down  notes  and  cor- 
rections upon  the  proofs  of  the  Minority  Report. 
He  found  it  increasingly  difficult  to  make  deci- 
sions; he  would  correct  and  alter  back  and  then 
repeat  the  correction,  perhaps  half  a  dozen  times. 
On  the  evening  of  the  second  day  his  lungs  became 
painful  and  his  breathing  difficult.  His  head  ached 
and  a  sense  of  some  great  impending  evil  came 
upon  him.  His  skin  was  suddenly  a  detestable 
garment  to  wear.  He  took  his  temperature  with 
a  little  clinical  thermometer  he  kept  by  him  and 
found  it  was  a  hundred  and  one.    He  telephoned 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    267 

hastily  for  Dr.  Martineau  and  without  waiting  for 
his  arrival,  took  a  hot  bath  and  got  into  bed. 
He  was  already  thoroughly  ill  when  the  doctor 
arrived. 

*  <  Forgive  my  sending  for  you, ' '  he  said.  ' '  Not 
your  line.  I  know.  .  .  .  My  wife's  G.P. — an  ex- 
asperating sort  of  ass.  Can't  stand  him.  No  one 
else." 

He  was  lying  on  a  narrow  little  bed  with  a  hard 
pillow  that  the  doctor  replaced  by  one  from  Lady 
Hardy's  room.  He  had  twisted  the  bed-clothes 
into  a  hopeless  muddle,  the  sheet  was  on  the  floor. 

Sir  Richmond's  bedroom  was  a  large  apartment 
in  which  sleep  seemed  to  have  been  an  admitted 
necessity  rather  than  a  principal  purpose.  On 
one  hand  it  opened  into  a  business-like  dressing 
and  bath  room,  on  the  other  into  the  day  study. 
It  bore  witness  to  the  nocturnal  habits  of  a  man 
who  had  Long  lived  a  life  of  irregular  impulses  to 
activity  and  dislocated  hours  and  habits.  There 
was  ;i  desk  and  reading  Lamp  for  night  work  near 
the  fireplace,  an  electric  kettle  for  making  tea 
at  night,  a  silver  biscuil  tin  ;  all  the  apparatus  for 
the  lonely  intent  Industry  of  the  small  hours. 
There  was  a  bookcase  of  blnebooks,  books  of  ref- 
erence and  suchlike  material,  and  souk-  files.  Over 
the  mantelpiece  was  an  enlarged  photograph  of 
Lady  Hardy  and  a  plain  office  calendar.  The  desk 
was  littered  with  the  galley  proofs  of  the  Minority 
Report  upon  which  Sir  Richmond  had  been  work- 


268        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

ing  up  to  the  moment  of  his  hasty  retreat  to  bed. 
And  lying  among  the  proofs,  as  though  it  had  been 
taken  out  and  looked  at  quite  recently,  was  the 
photograph  of  a  girl.  For  a  moment  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau's  mind  hung  in  doubt  and  then  he  knew  it 
for  the  young  American  of  Stonehenge.  How  that 
affair  had  ended  he  did  not  know.  And  now  it  was 
not  his  business  to  know. 

These  various  observations  printed  themselves 
on  Dr.  Martineau's  mind  after  his  first  cursory 
examination  of  his  patient  and  while  he  cast  about 
for  anything  that  would  give  this  large  industrious 
apartment  a  little  more  of  the  restfulness  and 
comfort  of  a  sick  room.  "I  must  get  in  a  night 
nurse  at  once,"  he  said.  "We  must  find  a  small 
table  somewhere  to  put  near  the  bed. 

"I  am  afraid  you  are  very  ill,"  he  said,  re- 
turning to  the  bedside.  "This  is  not,  as  you  say, 
my  sort  of  work.  Will  you  let  me  call  in  another 
man,  a  man  we  can  trust  thoroughly,  to  consult?" 

"I'm  in  your  hands,"  said  Sir  Richmond.  "I 
want  to  pull  through." 

1 '  He  will  know  better  where  to  get  the  right  sort 
of  nurse  for  the  case — and  everything. "... 

The  second  doctor  presently  came,  with  the 
right  sort  of  nurse  hard  on  his  heels.  Sir  Rich- 
mond submitted  almost  silently  to  his  expert  han- 
dling and  was  sounded  and  looked  to  and  listened 
at. 

"H'm,"  said  the  second  doctor,  and  then  en- 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    269 

couragingly  to  Sir  Richmond :  ' '  We  Ve  got  to  take 
care  of  you. 

" There's  a  lot  about  this  I  don't  like,"  said 
the  second  doctor  and  drew  Dr.  Martineau  by  the 
arm  towards  the  study.  For  a  moment  or  so  Sir 
Richmond  listened  to  the  low  murmur  of  their 
voices,  but  he  did  not  feel  very  deeply  interested 
in  what  they  were  saying.  He  began  to  think  what 
a  decent  chap  Dr.  Martineau  was,  how  helpful  and 
fine  and  forgiving  his  professional  training  had 
made  him,  how  completely  he  had  ignored  the 
smothered  incivilities  of  their  parting  at  Salis- 
bury. All  men  ought  to  have  some  such  training. 
Not  a  bad  idea  to  put  every  boy  and  girl  through 
a  year  or  so  of  hospital  service.  .  .  .  Sir  Rich- 
mond must  have  dozed,  for  his  next  perception 
was  of  Dr.  Martineau  standing  over  him  and  say- 
ing, "I  am  afraid,  my  dear  Hardy,  that  you  are 
very  ill  indeed.  Much  more  so  than  I  thought  you 
were  at  first." 

Sir  Richmond's  raised  eyebrows  conveyed  that 
he  accepted  this  fact. 

"I  think  Lady  Hardy  ought  to  be  sent  for." 

Sir  Richmond  shook  his  head  with  unexpected 
vigour. 

" Don't  want  her  about,"  lie  said,  and  after  a 
pause,  "Don't  want  anybody  about." 

"But  if  anything  happens V1 

"Send  then." 

An  expression  of  obstinate  calm  overspread  Sir 


270        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Richmond's  face.  He  seemed  to  regard  the  matter 
as  settled.    He  closed  his  eyes. 

For  a  time  Dr.  Martineau  desisted.  He  went 
to  the  window  and  turned  to  look  again  at  the 
impassive  figure  on  the  bed.  Did  Sir  Richmond 
fully  understand?  He  made  a  step  towards  his 
patient  and  hesitated.  Then  he  brought  a  chair 
and  sat  down  at  the  bedside. 

Sir  Richmond  opened  his  eyes  and  regarded  him 
with  a  slight  frown. 

"A  case  of  pneumonia,"  said  the  doctor,  "after 
great  exertion  and  fatigue,  may  take  very  rapid 
and  unexpected  turns. ' ' 

Sir  Richmond,  cheek  on  pillow,  seemed  to 
assent. 

"I  think  if  you  want  to  be  sure  that  Lady  Hardy 

sees  you  again ...  If  you  don 't  want  to  take 

risks  about  that .    .    .   One  never  knows  in 

these  cases.    Probably  there  is  a  night  train." 

Sir  Richmond  manifested  no  surprise  at  the 
warning.  But  he  stuck  to  his  point.  His  voice 
was  faint  but  firm.  ' '  Couldn  't  make  up  anything 
to  say  to  her.    Anything  she'd  like." 

Dr.  Martineau  rested  on  that  for  a  little  while. 
Then  he  said:  "If  there  is  anyone  else?" 

"Not  possible,"  said  Sir  Richmond,  with  his 
eyes  on  the  ceiling. 

"But  to  see?" 

Sir  Richmond  turned  his  head  to  Dr.  Martineau. 
His  face  puckered  like  a  peevish  child 's.    "  They 'd 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    271 

want  things  said  to  them.  .  .  .  Things  to  remem- 
ber. ...  I  can't.    I'm  tired  out." 

''Don't  trouble,"  whispered  Dr.  Martineau, 
suddenly  remorseful. 

But  Sir  Richmond  also  was  remorseful.  ' '  Give 
them  my  love,"  he  said.  "Best  love.  .  .  .  Old 
Martin.    Love.  ..." 

Dr.  Martineau  was  turning  away  when  Sir 
Richmond  spoke  again  in  a  whisper.  "Best  love. 
.  .  .  Poor  at  the  best.  ..." 

He  dozed  for  a  time.  Then  he  made  a  great 
effort.  "I  can't  see  them,  Martineau,  until  I've 
something  to  say.  It's  like  that.  Perhaps  I  shall 
think  of  some  kind  tilings  to  say — after  a  sleep. 
But  if  they  came  now.  ...  I'd  say  something 
wrong.  Be  cross  perhaps.  Hurt  someone.  I've 
hurl  so  many.  .  .  .  People  exaggerate.  .  .  .  Peo- 
ple exaggerate — importance  these  occasions." 

"Yes,  yes,"  whispered  Dr.  Martineau.  "I  quite 
understand." 

M 

For  a  time  Sir  Richmond  dozed.  Then  he 
stirred  and  mattered.  "Second  rate.  .  .  .  Poor 
at  the  best.  .  .  .  Love.  .  .  .  Work.    All.  .  .  ." 

"It  has  been  splendid  work,"  said  Dr.  Mar- 
tineau, and  was  noi  sure  thai  Sir  Richmond  heard. 

"Those  lasl  IVw  days  .  .  .  lost  my  -Tip.  .  .  . 
Always  lose  my  damned  grip- 


272        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"Ragged  them.  .  .  .  Put  their  backs  up.  .  .  . 
Silly.  .  .  . 

"Never.  .  .  .  Never  done  anything — well.  .  .  . 

"It's  done.    Done.    Well  or  ill.  .  .  . 

"Done." 

His  voice  sank  to  the  faintest  whisper.  "Done 
for  ever  and  ever  .  .  .  and  ever  .  .  .  and  ever." 

Again  he  seemed  to  doze. 

Dr.  Martineau  stood  up  softly.  Something  be- 
yond reason  told  him  that  this  was  certainly  a 
dying  man.  He  was  reluctant  to  go  and  he  had  an 
absurd  desire  that  someone,  someone  for  whom 
Sir  Richmond  cared,  should  come  and  say  good- 
bye to  him,  and  for  Sir  Richmond  to  say  good-bye 
to  someone.  He  hated  this  lonely  launching  from 
the  shores  of  life  of  one  who  had  sought  intimacy 
so  persistently  and  vainly.  It  was  extraordinary 
— he  saw  it  now  for  the  first  time — he  loved  this 
man.  If  it  had  been  in  his  power,  he  would  at 
that  moment  have  anointed  him  with  kindness. 

The  doctor  found  himself  standing  in  front  of 
the  untidy  writing  desk,  littered  like  a  recent  bat- 
tlefield. The  photograph  of  the  American  girl 
drew  his  eyes.  What  had  happened?  Was  there 
not  perhaps  some  word  for  her?  He  turned  about 
as  if  to  enquire  of  the  dying  man  and  found  Sir 
Richmond's  eyes  open  and  regarding  him.  In 
them  he  saw  an  expression  he  had  seen  there  once 
or  twice  before,  a  faint  but  excessively  irritating 
gleam  of  amusement. 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY     273 

"Oh! — Well!"  said  Dr.  Martineau  and  turned 
away.  He  went  to  the  window  and  stared  out  as 
his  habit  was. 

Sir  Richmond  continued  to  smile  dimly  at  the 
doctor's  back  until  his  eyes  closed  again. 

It  was  their  last  exchange.  Sir  Richmond  died 
that  night  in  the  small  hours,  so  quietly  that  for 
some  time  the  night  nurse  did  not  observe  what 
had  happened.  She  was  indeed  roused  to  that 
realization  by  the  ringing  of  the  telephone  bell  in 
the  adjacent  study. 

For  a  long  time  that  night  Dr.  Martineau  had 
lain  awake  unable  to  sleep.  He  was  haunted  by 
the  figure  of  Sir  Richmond  lying  on  his  uncom- 
fortable little  bed  in  his  big  bedroom  and  by  the 
curious  effect  of  loneliness  produced  by  the  noc- 
turnal desk  and  by  the  evident  dread  felt  by  Sir 
Richmond  of  any  death-bed  partings.  He  real- 
ized how  much  this  man,  who  had  once  sought  so 
feverishly  for  intimacies,  had  shrunken  back  upon 
himself,  how  solitary  his  motives  had  become,  how 
rarely  he  had  taken  counsel  with  anyone  in  his 
later  years.  His  mind  now  dwelt  apart.  Even  if 
people  came  about  him  he  would  still  be  facing 
death  alone. 

And  so  it  seemed  he  meant  to  slip  out  of  life, 
as  a  man  might  slip  out  of  a  crowded  assembly, 
unobserved.    Even  now  he  might  be  going.    The 


274        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

doctor  recalled  how  he  and  Sir  Richmond  had 
talked  of  the  rage  of  life  in  a  young  baby,  how  we 
drove  into  life  in  a  sort  of  fury,  how  that  rage 
impelled  us  to  do  this  and  that,  how  we  fought 
and  struggled  until  the  rage  spent  itself  and  was 
gone.  That  eddy  of  rage  that  was  Sir  Richmond 
was  now  perhaps  very  near  its  end.  Presently 
it  would  fade  and  cease,  and  the  stream  that  had 
made  it  and  borne  it  would  know  it  no  more. 

Dr.  Martineau's  thoughts  relaxed  and  passed 
into  the  picture  land  of  dreams.  He  saw  the  fig- 
ure of  Sir  Richmond,  going  as  it  were  away  from 
him  along  a  narrow  path,  a  path  that  followed  the 
crest  of  a  ridge,  between  great  darknesses,  enor- 
mous cloudy  darknesses,  above  him  and  below.  He 
was  going  along  this  path  without  looking  back, 
without  a  thought  for  those  he  left  behind,  with- 
out a  single  word  to  cheer  him  on  his  way,  walk- 
ing as  Dr.  Martineau  had  sometimes  watched  him 
walking,  without  haste  or  avidity,  walking  as  a 
man  might  along  some  great  picture  gallery  with 
which  he  was  perhaps  even  over  familiar.  His 
hands  would  be  in  his  pockets,  his  indifferent  eyes 
upon  the  clouds  about  him.  And  as  he  strolled 
along  that  path,  the  darkness  closed  in  upon  him. 
His  figure  became  dim  and  dimmer. 

Whither  did  that  figure  go?  Did  that  envelop- 
ing darkness  hide  the  beginnings  of  some  strange 
long  journey  or  would  it  just  dissolve  that  figure 
into  itself? 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    275 

Was  that  indeed  the  end? 

Dr.  Martineau  was  one  of  that  large  class  of 
people  who  can  neither  imagine  nor  disbelieve  in 
immortality.  Dimmer  and  dimmer  grew  the  fig- 
ure but  still  it  remained  visible.  As  one  can  con- 
tinue to  see  a  star  at  dawn  until  one  turns  away. 
Or  one  blinks  or  nods  and  it  is  gone. 

Vanished  now  are  the  beliefs  that  held  our  race 
for  countless  generations.  Where  now  was  that 
Path  of  the  Dead,  mapped  so  clearly,  faced  with 
such  certainty,  in  which  the  heliolithic  peoples 
believed  from  Avebury  to  Polynesia?  Not  al- 
ways have  we  had  to  go  alone  and  unprepared 
into  uncharted  darknesses.  For  a  time  the  dream 
artist  used  a  palette  of  the  doctor's  vague  mem- 
ories of  things  Egyptian,  he  painted  a  new  roll 
of  the  Book  of  the  Dead,  at  a  copy  of  which  the 
doctor  had  been  looking  a  day  or  so  before.  Sir 
Richmond  became  a  brown  naked  figure,  crossing 
a  bridge  of  danger,  passing  between  terrific  mon- 
sters, ferrying  a  dark  and  dreadful  stream.  He 
came  to  lie  scales  of  judgment  before  the  very 
Hi  rone  of  Osiris  and  stood  waiting  while  dog- 
headed  Annbis  weighed  his  conscience  and  that 
evil  monster,  the  Devourer  of  the  Dead,  crouched 
ready  it'  the  judgmenl  went  against  him.  The 
doctor's  attention  concentrated  upon  the  *c;\l 
A  memory  <>r  Swedenborg's  Heaven  and  Well 
mingled  with  the  Egyptian  fantasy.  Now  at  I. 
it  was  possible  t<>  know  something  real  about  this 


276        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

man's  soul,  now  at  last  one  could  look  into  the 
Secret  Places  of  his  Heart.  Anubis  and  Thoth, 
the  god  with  the  ibis  head,  were  reading  the  heart 
as  if  it  were  a  book,  reading  aloud  from  it  to  the 
supreme  judge. 

Suddenly  the  doctor  found  himself  in  his  own 
dreams.  His  anxiety  to  plead  for  his  friend  had 
brought  him  in.  He  too  had  become  a  little 
painted  figure  and  he  was  bearing  a  book  in  his 
hand.  He  wanted  to  show  that  the  laws  of  the 
new  world  could  not  be  the  same  as  those  of  the 
old,  and  the  book  he  was  bringing  as  evidence  was 
his  own  Psychology  of  a  New  Age. 

The  clear  thought  of  that  book  broke  up  his 
dream  by  releasing  a  train  of  waking  troubles. 
.  .  .  You  have  been  six  months  on  Chapter  Ten ; 
will  it  ever  be  ready  for  Osiris?  .  .  .  Will  it 
ever  be  ready  for  print?  .  .  . 

Dream  and  waking  thoughts  were  mingled  like 
sky  and  cloud  upon  a  windy  day  in  April.  Sud- 
denly he  saw  again  that  lonely  figure  on  the  nar- 
row way  with  darknesses  above  and  darknesses 
below  and  darknesses  on  every  hand.  But  this 
time  it  was  not  Sir  Richmond.  .  .  .  Who  was 
it?  Surely  it  was  Everyman.  Everyman  had  to 
travel  at  last  along  that  selfsame  road,  leaving 
love,  leaving  every  task  and  every  desire.  But  was 
it  Everyman?  ...  A  great  fear  and  horror  came 
upon  the  doctor.  That  little  figure  was  himself! 
And  the  book  which  was  his  particular  task  in 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY     277 

life  was  still  undone.  He  himself  stood  in  his 
turn  upon  that  lonely  path  with  the  engulfing 
darknesses  about  him.  .  .  . 

He  seemed  to  wrench  himself  awake. 

He  lay  very  still  for  some  moments  and  then 
he  sat  up  in  bed.  An  overwhelming  conviction 
had  arisen  in  his  mind  that  Sir  Richmond  was 
dead.  He  felt  he  must  know  for  certain.  He 
switched  on  his  electric  light,  mutely  interrogated 
his  round  face  reflected  in  the  looking  glass,  got 
out  of  bed,  shuffled  on  his  slippers  and  went 
along  the  passage  to  the  telephone.  He  hesitated 
for  some  seconds  and  then  lifted  the  receiver. 
It  was  his  call  which  aroused  the  nurse  to  the 
fact  of  Sir  Richmond's  death. 

Lady  Hardy  arrived  home  in  response  to  Dr. 
Martineau's  telegram  late  on  the  following  eve- 
ning. He  was  with  her  next  morning,  comforting 
and  sympathetic.  Her  big  blue  eyes,  bright  with 
tears,  met  his  very  wistfully;  her  little  body 
Beemed  very  small  and  pathetic  in  its  simple  black 
dross.  And  yd  there  was  a  sort  of  bravery  about 
her.    When  he  came  into  the  drawing-room  she 

was  in  one  of  the  window  recesses  talking  lo  a 

serious-looking  woman  of  the  dressmaker  type. 
She  ld'f  her  business  al   once  to  come  to  him, 

"Why  did  1  QOl  know  in  lime?"  she  cried. 


278        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"No  one,  dear  lady,  had  any  idea  until  late 
last  night,"  he  said,  taking  both  her  hands  in  his 
for  a  long  friendly  sympathetic  pressure. 

"I  might  have  known  that  if  it  had  been  possi- 
ble you  would  have  told  me, ' '  she  said. 

"You  know,"  she  added,  "I  don't  believe  it 
yet.  I  don't  realize  it.  I  go  about  these  formal- 
ities  " 

"I  think  I  can  understand  that." 

"He  was  always,  you  know,  not  quite  here.  .  .  . 
It  is  as  if  he  were  a  little  more  not  quite  here.  .  .  . 
I  can't  believe  it  is  over.  ..." 

She  asked  a  number  of  questions  and  took  the 
doctor's  advice  upon  various  details  of  the  ar- 
rangements. "My  daughter  Helen  comes  home 
to-morrow  afternoon,"  she  explained.  "She  is 
in  Paris.  But  our  son  is  far,  far  away  in  the  Pun- 
jab. I  have  sent  him  a  telegram.  ...  It  is  so 
kind  of  you  to  come  in  to  me." 

Dr.  Martineau  went  more  than  half  way  to 
meet  Lady  Hardy's  disposition  to  treat  him  as  a 
friend  of  the  family.  He  had  conceived  a  curious, 
half  maternal  affection  for  Sir  Kichmond  that 
had  survived  even  the  trying  incident  of  the  Salis- 
bury parting  and  revived  very  rapidly  during  the 
last  few  weeks.  This  affection  extended  itself 
now  to  Lady  Hardy.  Hers  was  a  type  that  had 
always  appealed  to  him.  He  could  understand 
so  well  the  perplexed  loyalty  with  which  she  was 
now  setting  herself  to  gather  together  some  pre- 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    279 

servative  and  reassuring  evidences  of  this  man 
who  had  always  been;  as  she  put  it,  "never  quite 
here."  It  was  as  if  she  felt  that  now  it  was  at 
last  possible  to  make  a  definite  reality  of  him.  He 
could  be  fixed.  And  as  he  was  fixed  he  would  stay. 
Never  more  would  he  be  able  to  come  in  and  with 
an  almost  expressionless  glance  wither  the  inter- 
pretation she  had  imposed  upon  him.  She  was 
finding  much  comfort  in  this  task  of  reconstruc- 
tion. She  had  gathered  together  in  the  drawing- 
room  every  presentable  portrait  she  had  been  able 
to  find  of  him.  He  had  never,  she  said,  sat  to  a 
painter,  but  there  was  an  early  pencil  sketch  done 
within  a  couple  of  years  of  their  marriage ;  there 
was  a  number  of  photographs,  several  of  which — 
she  wanted  the  doctor's  advice  upon  this  point — 
she  thought  might  be  enlarged;  there  was  a  statu- 
ette done  by  some  woman  artist  who  had  once 
beguiled  him  into  a  sitting.  There  was  also  a 
painting  she  had  had  worked  up  from  a  photo- 
graph and  some  notes.  She  Hilled  among  thi 
memorials,  going  from  one  l<>  the  other,  undecided 
which  to  make  the  standard  portrait.  "Thai 
painting,  1  think,  is  mosl  like,"  six-  said:  "as  he 
was  before  the  war.  But  the  war  and  the  Com 
misi  ion  changed  him,  worried  him  and  aged 
him.  .  .  .  I  grudged  him  to  that  Commission.  II<' 
Id,  it  worry  him  frightfully." 

"It  meant  very  much  f<>  him,"  said  Dr.  Mar 
tineau. 


280        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

"It  meant  too  much  to  him.  But  of  course  his 
ideas  were  splendid.  You  know  it  is  one  of  my 
hopes  to  get  some  sort  of  book  done,  explaining 
his  ideas.  He  would  never  write.  He  despised 
it — unreasonably.  A  real  thing  done,  he  said,  was 
better  than  a  thousand  books.  Nobody  read  books, 
he  said,  but  women,  parsons  and  idle  people.  But 
there  must  be  books.  And  I  want  one.  Some- 
thing a  little  more  real  than  the  ordinary  official 
biography.  ...  I  have  thought  of  young  Leigh- 
ton,  the  secretary  of  the  Commission.  He  seems 
thoroughly  intelligent  and  sympathetic  and  really 
anxious  to  reconcile  Richmond's  views  with  those 
of  the  big  business  men  on  the  Committee.  He 
might  do.  ...  Or  perhaps  I  might  be  able  to 
persuade  two  or  three  people  to  write  down  their 
impressions  of  him.  A  sort  of  memorial  volume. 
.  .  .  But  he  was  shy  of  friends.  There  was  no 
man  he  talked  to  very  intimately  about  his  ideas 
unless  it  was  to  you  ...  I  wish  I  had  the  writ- 
er's gift,  doctor." 

§7 

It  was  on  the  second  afternoon  that  Lady  Hardy 
summoned  Dr.  Martineau  by  telephone.  "Some- 
thing rather  disagreeable,"  she  said.  "If  you 
could  spare  the  time.    If  you  could  come  round. 

"It  is  frightfully  distressing,"  she  said  when 
he  got  round  to  her,  and  for  a  time  she  could  tell 
him  nothing  more.    She  was  having  tea  and  she 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY     281 

gave  him  some.  She  fussed  about  with  cream 
and  cakes  and  biscuits.  He  noted  a  crumpled 
letter  thrust  under  the  edge  of  the  silver  tray. 

* '  He  talked,  I  know,  very  intimately  with  you, ' ' 
she  said,  coming  to  it  at  last.  "He  probably 
went  into  things  with  you  that  he  never  talked 
about  with  anyone  else.  Usually  he  was  very  re- 
served. Even  with  me  there  were  things  about 
which  he  said  nothing." 

"We  did,"  said  Dr.  Martineau  with  discretion, 
"deal  a  little  with  his  private  life." 

"There  was  someone " 

Dr.  Martineau  nodded  and  then,  not  to  be  too 
portentous,  took  and  bit  a  biscuit. 

"Did  he  by  any  chance  ever  mention  someone 
called  Martin  Leeds?" 

Dr.  Martineau  seemed  to  reflect.  Then  realiz- 
ing that  this  was  a  mistake,  he  said:  "He  told 
me  the  essential  facts." 

The  poor  lady  breathed  ;i  sigh  of  relief.  "I'm 
glad,"  she  said  simply.  She  repeated,  "Yes,  I'm 
glad.    It  makes  things  easier  now." 

Dr.  Martineau  looked  his  enquiry. 

"She  wants  to  come  and  see  him." 

"Here?" 

"Here!  And  Helen  here!  And  the  servants 
noticing  everything!  I  've  aever  met  her.  Never 
set  eyes  on  her.  For  ;ill  I  know  she  may  want  to 
make  a  scene."  There  was  infinite  dismay  in  her 
voice. 


282        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

Dr.  Martineau  was  grave.  "You  would  rather 
not  receive  her?" 

"I  don't  want  to  refuse  her.  I  don't  want  even 
to  seem  heartless.  I  understand,  of  course,  she 
has  a  sort  of  claim."  She  sobbed  her  reluctant 
admission.  "I  know  it.  I  know.  .  .  .  There  was 
much  between  them." 

Dr.  Martineau  pressed  the  limp  hand  upon  the 
little  tea  table.  "I  understand,  dear  lady,"  he 
said.    "I  understand.    Now  .  .  .  suppose  I  were 

to  write  to  her  and  arrange I  do  not  see.  that 

you  need  be  put  to  the  pain  of  meeting  her.  Sup- 
pose I  were  to  meet  her  here  myself?" 

"If  you  could!" 

The  doctor  was  quite  prepared  to  save  the 
lady  any  further  distresses,  no  matter  at  what 
trouble  to  himself.  "You  are  so  good  to  me," 
she  said,  letting  the  tears  have  their  way  with 
her. 

"I  am  silly  to  cry,"  she  said,  dabbing  her  eyes. 

"We  will  get  it  over  to-morrow,"  he  reassured 
her.    "You  need  not  think  of  it  again." 

He  took  over  Martin's  brief  note  to  Lady  Hardy 
and  set  to  work  by  telegram  to  arrange  for  her 
visit.  She  was  in  London  at  her  Chelsea  flat  and 
easily  accessible.  She  was  to  come  to  the  house 
at  mid-day  on  the  morrow,  and  to  ask  not  for  Lady 
Hardy  but  for  him.  He  would  stay  by  her  while 
she  was  in  the  house,  and  it  would  be  quite  easy 
for  Lady  Hardy  to  keep  herself  and  her  daughter 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY     283 

out  of  the  way.  They  could,  for  example,  go  out 
quietly  to  the  dressmakers  in  the  closed  car,  for 
many  little  things  about  the  mourning  still  re- 
mained to  be  seen  to. 

§8 

Miss  Martin  Leeds  arrived  punctually,  but  the 
doctor  was  well  ahead  of  his  time  and  ready  to 
receive  her.  She  was  ushered  into  the  drawing- 
room  where  he  awaited  her.  As  she  came  for- 
ward the  doctor  first  perceived  that  she  had  a 
very  sad  and  handsome  face,  the  face  of  a  sensi- 
tive youth  rather  than  the  face  of  a  woman.  She 
had  fine  grey  eyes  under  very  fine  brows;  they 
were  eyes  that  at  other  times  might  have  laughed 
very  agreeably,  but  which  were  now  full  of  an 
unrestrained  sadness.  Her  brown  hair  was  very 
untidy  and  parted  at  the  side  like  a  man's.  Then 
he  noted  that  she  seemed  to  be  very  untidily 
dressed  as  if  she  was  that  rare  and,  to  him,  very 
offensive  thing,  a  woman  careless  of  her  beauty. 
She  was  short  in  proportion  to  her  broad  figure 
and  her  broad  forehead. 

"You  are  Dr.  Martineau?"  she  said.  "He 
talked  of  you."  As  she  spoke  her  glance  went 
from  him  to  the  pictures  that  stood  about  the 
room.  She  walked  up  to  the  {minting  and  stood  in 
front  of  it  with  her  distressed  ga/.c  wandering 
about  her.  "Horrible!"  she  said.  "Absolutely 
horrible!  .  .  .  Did  she  do  this?" 


284        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEAET 

Her  question  disconcerted  the  doctor  very  much. 
"You  mean  Lady  Hardy?"  he  asked.  "She 
doesn't  paint." 

"No,  no.  I  mean,  did  she  get  all  these  things 
together?" 

"Naturally,"  said  Dr.  Martineau. 

"None  of  them  are  a  bit  like  him.  They  are 
like  blows  aimed  at  his  memory.  Not  one  has 
his  life  in  it.  How  could  she  do  it?  Look  at 
that  idiot  statuette !  ...  He  was  extraordinarily 
difficult  to  get.  I  have  burnt  every  photograph 
I  had  of  him.  For  fear  that  this  would  happen ; 
that  he  would  go  stiff  and  formal — just  as  you 
have  got  him  here.  I  have  been  trying  to  sketch 
him  almost  all  the  time  since  he  died.  But  I  can't 
get  him  back.    He's  gone." 

She  turned  to  the  doctor  again.  She  spoke  to 
him,  not  as  if  she  expected  him  to  understand  her, 
but  because  she  had  to  say  these  things  which 
burthened  her  mind  to  someone.  "I  have  done 
hundreds  of  sketches.  My  room  is  littered  with 
them.  When  you  turn  them  over  he  seems  to  be 
lurking  among  them.    But  not  one  of  them  is  like 

him." 

She  was  trying  to  express  something  beyond 
her  power.  "It  is  as  if  someone  had  suddenly 
turned  out  the  light." 

She  followed  the  doctor  upstairs.  "This  was 
his  study,"  the  doctor  explained. 

"I  know  it.    I  came  here  once,"  she  said. 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY    285 

They  entered  the  big  bedroom  in  which  the 
coffined  body  lay.  Dr.  Martineau,  struck  by  a 
sudden  memory,  glanced  nervously  at  the  desk, 
but  someone  had  made  it  quite  tidy  and  the  por- 
trait of  Miss  Grammont  had  disappeared.  Miss 
Leeds  walked  straight  across  to  the  coffin  and 
stood  looking  down  on  the  waxen  inexpressive 
dignity  of  the  dead.  Sir  Richmond's  brows  and 
nose  had  become  sharper  and  more  clear-cut  than 
they  had  ever  been  in  life  and  his  lips  had  set 
into  a  faint  inane  smile.  She  stood  quite  still 
for  a  long  time.    At  length  she  sighed  deeply. 

She  spoke,  a  little  as  though  she  thought  aloud, 
a  little  as  though  she  talked  at  that  silent  pres- 
ence in  the  coffin.  "I  think  he  loved,"  she  said. 
' '  Sometimes  I  think  he  loved  me.  But  it  is  hard 
to  tell.  lie  was  kind.  He  could  be  intensely  kind 
and  yet  he  didn't  seem  to  care  for  you.  He  could 
be  intensely  selfish  and  yet  he  certainly  did  not 
can-  for  himself.  .  .  .  Anyhow,  I  loved  him.  .  .  . 
There  is  nothing  left  in  me  now  to  love  anyone 
else — for  ever.  ..." 

She  pnl  her  hands  behind  her  back  and  looked 
at  the  dead  man  with  her  head  a  little  on  one 
side.     "Too  kind,"  she  said  very  softly. 

"There  was  a  SOrl  of  dishonesty  in  his  kindness. 
He  would  not  let  you  have  the  hitler  truth.  He 
would  no1  say  be  did  not  love  you.  .  .  . 

"He  was  too  kind  to  life  ever  to  call  it  the  fool- 
ish thing  it  is.     He  took  it  seriously  because  it 


286        SECRET  PLACES  OF  THE  HEART 

takes  itself  seriously.  He  worked  for  it  and 
killed  himself  with  work  for  it.  .  .  . " 

She  turned  to  Dr.  Martineau  and  her  face  was 
streaming  with  tears.  "And  life,  you  know,  isn't 
to  be  taken  seriously.  It  is  a  joke — a  bad  joke — 
made  by  some  cruel  little  god  who  has  caught  a 
neglected  planet.  .  .  .  Like  torturing  a  stray 
cat.  .  .  .  But  he  topk  it  seriously  and  he  gave  up 
his  life  for  it. 

"There  was  much  happiness  he  might  have 
had.  He  was  very  capable  of  happiness.  But  he 
never  seemed  happy.  This  work  of  his  came  be- 
fore it.  He  overworked  and  fretted  our  happiness 
away.    He  sacrificed  his  happiness  and  mine." 

She  held  out  her  hands  towards  the  doctor. 
"What  am  I  to  do  now  with  the  rest  of  my  life? 
Who  is  there  to  laugh  with  me  now  and  jest? 

"I  don't  complain  of  him.  I  don't  blame  him. 
He  did  his  best — to  be  kind. 

"But  all  my  days  now  I  shall  mourn  for  him 
and  long  for  him.  ..." 

She  turned  back  to  the  coffin.  Suddenly  she  lost 
every  vestige  of  self-control.  She  sank  down  on 
her  knees  beside  the  trestle.  "Why  have  you 
left  me?"  she  cried. 

"  Oh !  Speak  to  me,  my  darling !  Speak  to  me, 
I  tell  you!    Speak  to  me!" 

It  was  a  storm  of  passion,  monstrously  childish 
and  dreadful.    She  beat  her  hands  upon  the  cof- 


LAST  DAYS  OF  SIR  RICHMOND  HARDY  287 

fin.  She  wept  loudly  and  fiercely  as  a  child 
does.  .  .  . 

Dr.  Martineau  drifted  feebly  to  the  window. 

He  wished  he  had  locked  the  door.  The  serv- 
ants might  hear  and  wonder  what  it  was  all  about. 
Always  he  had  feared  love  for  the  cruel  thing  it 
was,  but  now  it  seemed  to  him  for  the  first  time 
that  he  realized  its  monstrous  cruelty. 


THE  END 


DATE  DUE 

CAYLORO 

PRINTED  IhU    ft-  A 

PR5774    S43  AA    000  642  603    5 

rtells,    Herbert   George,    1866- 

1946. 
The  secret   places   of    the 

near t. 


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